


An Unusual Association

by RoseAngel



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, M/M, Vampire Sherlock, Werewolf John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-06
Updated: 2016-04-02
Packaged: 2018-02-07 15:51:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 50
Words: 116,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1904832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseAngel/pseuds/RoseAngel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 126 years of existing as a vampire, Sherlock Holmes had learnt two things. The first was that immortality was overrated. The second was that werewolves were dull, primitive creatures who would act on instinct and go for the throat of any vampire of whom they caught a scent. Then he met John Watson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

For many humans, there is something desirable about the idea of immortality. The world has much to offer – there are so many things to do and places to see. People make bucket lists of things to do before they die that they are likely to never complete. No matter the age or reason, death is sudden and unexpected, and there is no way to plan for it, to ensure that you experience everything that you want in life before it comes to an end. For that reason, there is something exquisite about the idea of living forever. To have all the time in the world to travel and sightsee, to go to concerts and shows, and to spend years doing nothing productive without feeling as though you're wasting your life away is an impossible ideal, a beautiful dream.

What humans don't know is that immortality is so unbearably  _dull_.

Even in his thirty-three years of being human, Sherlock Holmes had learnt how painfully boring the world could be. From time to time, there would be something to make him feel alive – a gruesome murder to investigate, bodies torn to shreds by not animals but men. There were often experiments to be had, chemicals to be combined, and tests to be run. Yet sometimes, sometimes there was nothing; there was no reason to go outside, nor attempt to interact with any single being. Sometimes, there was boredom, the sort that seeps into your brain and spreads through your body, leaving you with neither the strength nor the motivation to push yourself up onto your feet. Some days, no matter how hard you try, no matter how many distractions you seek, there is a boredom that cannot be relieved.

Then, in the winter of 1887, the blood was drained from Sherlock's body and replaced with the blood of a vampire. Of course, there was the initial fascination, the enthrallment of inhumane strength and enhanced senses, and the blood, sweeter than any substance he had ever injected into his veins. Eventually, however, there came the sort of boredom that could last an eternity. After existing for over a century, with the knowledge that that amount of time could be only a fraction of the total amount that he would spend on this earth, existence began to seem pointless, immortality overrated. There is only so much joy and excitement in a world that, though constantly developing, never seems to change. Technology improves, medical research lengthens the human lifespan, and yet, the world continues to turn, people are born and people die, and everything begins to seem monotonous. It feels as though the past is repeating itself over and over, but no human lives long enough to notice. After spending so long on this earth, it's so easy to become lethargic, to fail to see the point in anything at all.

Occasionally, there is relief. Occasionally, there is a mystery to solve, an adventure to be had. There is something strange, something exciting, to hold his attention for days, maybe even weeks, but in the end, the feeling is lost, and the boredom seeps in once again.

Yet sometimes, very, very rarely, there is something unusual, something new. Sometimes, there is a reason to feel alive, to feel grateful to be here for this experience, and sometimes, this reason comes in the most unexpected of forms.

OoO

Whether lying on the sofa or walking through the streets, no matter how distracted he may seem to be by the thoughts inside his head, Sherlock Holmes was always aware of the goings on around him. Even in boredom, he could never turn his brain off; if he passed a human in the streets he would be deducing them - their relationship status, career, intentions. If he entered a room, he would be conscious of anything that had changed since he had last been there, anything that was out of place. With each of his senses enhanced, it was easy for him to observe and deduce, to notice things that most humans would miss.

So, naturally, when there was an unusual smell in the air one afternoon, it took him only a fraction of a second to notice, and scarcely more than that to identify it:  _werewolf_.

It certainly would not be the first werewolf that Sherlock had come across during his existence – the vampire had to move around often to avoid drawing attention to the fact that he was not ageing, and some of the places he had visited were heavily populated with the creatures. These places were ones he would not spend very long in, if he could help it. Werewolves were territorial creatures, and they would not respond well to the smell of a creature that could kill them with one bite, as they could do to him. No supernatural creatures got along, but vampires and werewolves posed such a risk to one another's existence that they could be considered biological enemies, and there were very few parts of the world where they happily coexist.

This particular werewolf, however, would be the first that Sherlock had the unfortunate chance of meeting in London. Being a large, busy city with plenty of hospitals and blood banks (or even willing donors), and with the days often being overcast, London certainly was not a bad choice of home for a vampire. The scent of the undead all through the city was usually enough to drive away any werewolf who did consider moving in, and even without this, it would not be popular amongst werewolves. Whilst vampires preferred busy cities, werewolves were known to occupy the quieter locations, places where they were less likely to be seen, where there was less risk of them coming across too many unsuspecting humans. Werewolves preferred locations with forests or woods, not with bright lights and tall towers. It didn't make sense, why this werewolf would therefore be in London, and so it was only natural that this unusual werewolf would catch Sherlock's attention.

He scanned the park quickly, and it only took him a moment to locate where the scent was coming from. The werewolf was in human form – unsurprising, given the time of the day and the general desire of all supernatural creatures to not end up the test subject of scientific experiments. He was a military man, judging by his haircut and the way he held himself, and the cane and limp suggested he was wounded in battle. He walked as if he knew the place, but Sherlock had never noticed him or his scent before – he must have lived here years ago and returned here only very recently, likely after being invalidated home. That would explain why he was in London, despite it being vampire territory. It was likely that he had been bitten when he was abroad, and he would have returned to his previous home of London because he didn't know any better.

All this was deduced in a mere couple of seconds, but these observations were overshadowed by the far more pressing one – the werewolf was walking towards him.

Sherlock stiffened imperceptibly, doing his best not to stare. He pursed his lips shut, feeling his fangs lengthening inside his mouth, preparing for a confrontation. The instinctual reaction would be to either fight or flee, before the werewolf had the chance to harm him, and Sherlock knew his scent would set off the same instincts in the wolf. Sherlock had the sort of self-control needed to avoid this sort of brawl in the middle of the park, but werewolves were far more primitive, far more likely to act on these instincts.

The park was filled with humans, and even idiots would notice if the man walking towards Sherlock suddenly shifted into the form of a wolf, just as they would notice if Sherlock opened his mouth and exposed unnaturally sharp teeth. If they fought, exposure of both their species was at risk, and yet Sherlock knew from experience that werewolves could, and would attack anyway, responding to instinct rather than logical thought. Sherlock considered running, turning on his heels and escaping before a confrontation occurred, but if he could smell the wolf, the wolf could smell him, and running would only result in a chase.

There were no more than five steps in between him and the werewolf; there was no way he could get away in time.

Four steps; his fangs pressed against the inside of his lips.

Three steps; his body prepared to block an attack, to duck and move the moment the werewolf lunged.

Two steps; the werewolf wrinkled his nose and looked around.

One step; their eyes met, and Sherlock prepared to move.

Zero.

The werewolf shifted his gaze from Sherlock's eyes (the contact had been so brief, with a human he would have assumed that they had not seen him at all) to face ahead; he passed Sherlock and -

\- kept walking without a word, leaving Sherlock frowning behind him.

 _That_ was unusual.

Sherlock looked over his shoulder quickly, body still stiff and ready to move, in case this werewolf was intelligent enough to have planned out a course of action and was prepared to attack from behind. However, the werewolf was still walking, without looking back. His heart rate sounded accelerated, more so than it should have been for a man taking a walk through the park at that pace, but otherwise, he didn't seem to have noticed Sherlock at all. His body was showing none of the initial signs of shifting – his hair wasn't lengthening and his body wasn't beginning to contort and shift. To a human walking by, there would be nothing abnormal about the man with the cane, and that was precisely why this situation was not normal in the slightest.

Sherlock watched as the man continued to walk, putting more and more distance in between them. It didn't make any sense. Sherlock had never met a werewolf with that much self-control, with the ability to pass a vampire without batting an eyelid. The creature should have shifted, lunged at his throat; at very least he should have shown signs suggesting that he was putting in the effort to control himself, consciously suppressing the instinctual urge to kill. Yet there he was, going about his day as if nothing unusual had occurred at all.

This was the only werewolf in London, as far as Sherlock was concerned, and the only werewolf he had met who had not lunged at Sherlock's throat upon catching his scent.

This werewolf was unusual, in more ways than one, and perhaps something this unusual was worth investigating.


	2. Chapter 2

Werewolf scent trails were never difficult to follow. Whether they intended it to or not, a werewolf's scent lingered for hours, even days after they passed through an area. It marked areas as their territory, marked ownership of the things they touch, and it could even mark members of their pack. If you knew what you were doing, you could follow a werewolf home hours after they had left, and you could work out precisely what route they had taken. As he walked through the park, Sherlock could tell exactly where the werewolf had stepped, and which bench he had sat down on. If he focussed hard enough, he could work out where the werewolf had paused or waited, and where he had walked past quickly.

With this knowledge, there was no need for Sherlock to follow the creature immediately; it wouldn't matter if he lost track of the man. With Russell Square Gardens as a starting point, he could spend a few hours on other tasks before he began the task of locating the werewolf and determining whether or not he planned to stay in London. This was useful, because Sherlock wasn't foolish enough to believe that avoiding a fight once guaranteed that the werewolf would not lash out and attack him the next time they met. He would be an idiot if he decided to hunt down a werewolf on an empty stomach, and Sherlock Holmes was most definitely not an idiot.

After the newborn vampire stage of insatiable hunger, the average vampire required a pint of blood every day or two to continue functioning at full strength. They could survive starving for longer, but as their body processed the blood from their last feeding, they would become weaker and weaker until they were, for all intents and purposes, nothing but a cold corpse. Sherlock, however, was not the average vampire. Ironic as it may be, given that blood gives vampires strength, Sherlock had always insisted that processing blood slowed him down, and it was an inconvenience for him to have to take time out of his day to do so. His body had become used to functioning on less blood than the average vampire a long time ago; he pushed through the hunger with sheer willpower alone.

It had been two days now since the last time Sherlock had fed, and although on a normal day he wouldn't bother, he knew better than to go into a potential fight in this state. He had used up the last of the blood bags he stored in his fridge the last time that he fed, but that was of no concern, because he knew of a pathologist at St Bart's Hospital who had proved on multiple occasions her willingness to give him what he needed.

OoO

To call St Bart's Hospital Sherlock Holmes' second home would not be an entirely incorrect statement. Although he had no sentimental attachment to the hospital as most would do to the place they call home, he tended to spend as much, if not more, time there than he did at his own flat. On top of the bodies that he examined when consulting on cases for Scotland Yard, St Bart's provided him with scientific equipment that he had access to nowhere else, to use for cases, experiments, or simply for his own pleasure. His presence at the hospital was normal, even expected – one of the professors, Mike Stamford, had introduced him to his class when they passed the lab he was using, and warned them that they would likely run into him on many occasions. Most of the time, people would pass by him with as much notice as they would give to any member of the hospital staff.

Molly Hooper was the exception to this rule.

"Sherlock!" she gasped when he opened the door to the lab she was using, almost dropping the vials in her hands. Sherlock didn't miss the way her heart beat accelerated, sending a pink flush to her cheeks. "I didn't know you were coming in today. Are you working?"

"No, not today," Sherlock replied, taking a few steps into the lab and letting the door swing shut behind him. "I needed to come in to see you."

" _Me_?"

"Yes, you, Molly Hooper." Sherlock took a few more steps towards her, closing the distance between them. Loud and clear, he could hear her erratic heartbeat and the slight intake of breath as he came to a stop in front of her. "I need you to get me some more blood bags."

She opened and closed her mouth soundlessly a few times before she managed to speak. "More? But I just gave you some fresh ones a couple of weeks ago. I really can't keep giving them to you..."

"They're absolutely vital to my experiment." He watched her gaze as she looked away, clearly reluctant to give in and give him what he needed, and so he pressed on, "It is a matter of life and death."

She chewed on her lower lip, making an uncertain sound, and he knew that she was trying to find a way to say no, struggling to resist. He lowered his shoulders in a way that made him look smaller even though he easily towered over her, gave her a pleading expression, and lowered his voice to a softer, gentler tone. "Please, Molly," he said, and it was easy to see the way that the rarely used word drew her gaze back to him. "It would mean a great deal if you would do this, for me." He added the last two words as an afterthought, and he saw her resolve break.

"I... all right, I'll see what I can do."

"Would you? Thank you," Sherlock replied, giving her a large smile. "I'll be upstairs."

She smiled back at him, and he kept the expression on his face until she had turned away.

OoO

There was plenty that Sherlock could do to amuse himself while he waited for Molly to return with the blood. He had moved into one of the unoccupied labs upstairs – his usual one, so that Molly would know where to find him as soon as she was ready – and he was studying a slide beneath one of the microscopes when he heard footsteps heading towards the lab. Normally, he would pay no mind to it – there were plenty of other labs that weren't being used, and people tended to choose labs that were unoccupied rather than labs that already had someone using them. However, although he could only hear one set of footsteps, the person walking towards the lab had two scents.

The stronger scent was clearly that of Mike Stamford, which Sherlock could have deduced from the sound of his footsteps alone. The other was the same scent that Sherlock had caught not an hour ago at the park.

Mike rounded the corner, stepping into the room. "Oh, hello," he said as he caught sight of Sherlock, tossing an apparently empty cup of coffee into the rubbish bin by the door. "Just came to get my coat," he added in explanation, gesturing to where his coat was draped over the back of one of the chairs.

Sherlock peered at him over the top of the microscope, inhaling through his nose. The smell was definitely there; Mike had to have run into the werewolf that Sherlock had seen earlier. It was stronger than Sherlock would have expected it to be, however, had the two of them simply walked past each other and continued on their way. There had to be more to it than that.

"I would have thought you would have gone home by now," he commented, and Mike, ever talkative, responded in precisely the way that Sherlock had hoped he would.

"No, I ran into an old friend of mine on my walk."

"An old friend?"

"Yeah. John Watson; have I mentioned him? We trained together here before he went off and joined the army. Good to see him, it was. Nice to get back in touch with old mates, you know?"

Sherlock hummed absently, gaze flickering down briefly to the outline he could see in the pocket of Mike's coat. "Mike, can I borrow your phone?"

OoO

Less than an hour later, Sherlock was stepping up to the door of his flat on Baker Street with a box of blood bags (given to him with a half-hearted warning from Molly that she  _really_  couldn't keep giving these to him whenever he wanted) and this John Watson's phone number, saved into his phone under the letter 'W' (for  _Watson_ , for  _werewolf_ , for  _weird_ ). He held the box beneath one arm as he unlocked the door, returning his landlady's greeting and disappearing up the stairs before she had the chance to ask him what he was carrying.

He put all but one of the blood bags into the bottom of the fridge, pulled out a mug from the top shelf in the cupboard, and then he let his fangs extend so he could tear the last bag open with his teeth. He poured the contents into the mug, and then placed it in the microwave, drumming his fingertips along the countertop impatiently as he waited for it to finish.

Drinking blood from a bag was never the same as drinking from a live human being. It gave the same feeling of satisfaction, of fullness, as processed food did for a human – it could fill them up, but not in the same way that fresh, well prepared meals could. Drinking packaged blood didn't give the same rush that came with properly feeding. Heating the blood to body temperature was easily preferable to drinking it cold, but it would never quite be the same. Vampires weren't made to drink from a mug; their fangs would extend even if they did not need to bite anything, and they would click against the rim of the mug, making it awkward to drink from.

However, bagged blood was, as far as Sherlock was concerned, much more convenient, and infinitely preferable to the alternatives. There were too many risks involved in the more primitive task of hunting – risks of getting caught and exposed, of the chosen victim putting up a struggle, and, of course, the risk of draining them dry. Sherlock helped investigate and solve murders; he had no interest in being the cause of one. His brother had suggested on many occasions that Sherlock follow in his footsteps and find a regular feeder ("walking blood bag", Sherlock called them), but this was inconvenient in its own way. To a human, vampire venom was like a drug, and prolonged exposure could lead to addiction, mistaken for feelings of attachment, of love. Having to care for a human who wanted to go everywhere with him seemed even less desirable than feeding off a stranger in the streets.

The microwave beeped, and Sherlock took the mug from it, carrying it over to his desk and placing it down beside his laptop.

"John Watson" was a disgustingly common name, but, with the addition of the werewolf's mobile phone number and access to certain databases, it wasn't difficult to find the right one. The internet made it so much easier to find information on people than it had been in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, especially since people started putting every little detail about their life online. This John Watson seemed to be no exception to this rule; after a few minutes, Sherlock discovered that the man had a blog. He knew immediately that it was the right John Watson, as he gave the same details on the website that Sherlock had deduced when he had seen him (" _I am an experienced medical doctor recently returned from Afghanistan_ "). In addition, the picture on the side was clearly the same man that Sherlock had seen earlier, although from an earlier time – the man in the picture had to be at least five years younger, not yet impacted by the traumas of war.

The blog itself was unbearably dull, holding only a few posts that could scarcely be considered posts and some odd comments by Harry Watson ( _clearly related, likely a brother given the style of writing_ ) and Bill Murray ( _old friend, served together, lost contact but eager to get back in touch_ ). It was almost laughable – the werewolf was unusual, interesting, and yet his blog was painful to look at. "Nothing happens to me", read one of the earlier posts, but that had to be a lie. Something very interesting had happened to this John Watson while he was away in Afghanistan, something far too interesting to be shared online.

Sherlock slammed the laptop lid shut, drained the rest of the blood, and then grabbed his coat as he walked out the door.


	3. Chapter 3

"I see you've started writing in your blog," said Ella.

It wasn't a question, and so John saw no reason to reply. This was standard for his therapy sessions; Ella would prompt him to speak, and sometimes he would go as far as to offer a short, simple sentence in response. She would scribble something into her little black book, he would alternate between studying her writing upside-down and looking at the clock, and this would continue for the full hour until the session came to an end. Then they would confirm the time and date of next week's appointment, and he would limp out of the room feeling neither better nor worse than when he had come in.

He knew that therapy was a good thing and would probably help many people, and he knew that Ella was a good therapist. However, therapy was most beneficial for people who were comfortable with talking about their problems, and John simply did not fall into that category. Even before Afghanistan, when he was a kid, or while he was studying medicine at university, he had always been the sort of person to just bottle up his problems and hope they would go away on their own. He knew it wasn't the healthiest way to handle them, and there had been days when he had lost his temper and taken it out on someone who definitely did not deserve to be shouted at, but keeping it all to himself always seemed easier than finding someone to talk to. Serving in Afghanistan had not changed that, and so, unsurprisingly, spending an hour a week sitting in a room  _not_  talking about his problems did not seem to make his life any better.

On top of that, it certainly didn't help that he couldn't exactly say "Got bitten by a werewolf, now constantly dreading the next full moon."

"There was a comment on one of your earlier posts from someone named Bill Murray," Ella pressed on. "Who is he?"

"He's the nurse who saved my life when I got shot," John replied, almost mechanically. It was true, but it wasn't the whole truth; like everything he told Ella about Afghanistan and getting shot, it left out the one very important detail that he would never be able to explain. Bill was the only person who knew exactly what had happened to John in Afghanistan. He had treated the bite as well as the bullet wound, and he was the reason John hadn't killed anyone the first time he shifted.

"You were friends before that happened, too?" Ella raised her tone at the end of the sentence, turning it into a question, and John decided to give her a response, even though it was a non-committal one.

"You tend to become close to the people you serve with, while you're there."

Ella hummed and scribbled something else down in her book (she had taken to positioning herself in a way that made it hard for him to see what she was writing, but he still managed to make out the word  _distanced_ ) before continuing. "Are you going to get in contact with him?"

John shrugged. "Maybe."

"I think you should," said Ella. ( _Of course you do_ , thought John.) "You need to start getting in touch with other people again, starting with your friends. You'll find it easier to readjust if you have the support of people who care about you."

John looked up at the clock on the wall, and willed time to go faster.

OoO

The sun was beginning to sink low in the sky by the time John's therapy session ended. He took the Tube instead of a cab, because he knew he could not keep taking cabs everywhere if he didn't find himself a job, but it meant that his leg was aching when he was still several streets from his flat. He kept a firm grip on his cane and kept his eyes locked ahead of him, avoiding the gaze of any strangers who might give him the pitying looks that he hated.

There was an unpleasant scent in the air as he walked – the same smell that he had noticed when he was walking through Russell Square Gardens earlier that day, one that made him tense and uncomfortable. He wrinkled his nose in distaste, doing his best to ignore it as he continued on his way. Cities were never known to smell nice, but he had never noticed exactly how awful the scent was until his senses had become so enhanced. It was yet another thing he could add to his ever-growing list of reasons to hate his new life.

He was about two streets away from his flat when he became convinced he was being watched. He could feel it – the prickling sensation on the back of his neck, making him tense his shoulders and want to turn around. He tried to ignore it at first, continuing to walk as if nothing was the matter, but he couldn't shrug off the feeling that something was wrong. He couldn't push away the idea that he was being followed, even when he turned a corner and took a longer, more unusual route back to his flat.

He glanced over his shoulder a few times, at first pretending to stretch his neck or look up at the sky, later doing so suddenly in hopes of catching his stalker unaware and getting a proper look at them. Every time, he saw something move out of the corner of his eye, a flicker of a shadow too fast for him to be certain he saw anything at all, but by the time his head had turned fully there was nothing to be seen. It didn't reassure him that there was nothing there at all, however; with every missed glance, he began to feel more and more on edge, more convinced that there was something to be worried about.

He found himself longing for the sensation of his gun, pressing against the small of his back. Even if he wasn't going to fire it, it was reassuring to have it there, to know that, if the situation got bad enough, he would have a way of defending himself. Without it, he felt empty, defenceless even with the training he had in hand-to-hand combat. He found himself wondering how good a weapon his cane would make, if need be.

He turned into his street, slowing his pace a little. He tried to quieten his footsteps, to work out if he could hear another set behind him, but the street was almost eerily quiet. He stopped just before he had made it to the front door of his block of flats, and turned his head suddenly, looking around. There was no flicker of movement in the corner of his eye this time, and there wasn't a soul in sight.

In one of his earlier therapy sessions, Ella had told him about the risk of post-traumatic stress disorder, and she had given him some pamphlets on the disorder that he had refused to read. He wondered if, perhaps, paranoia was a symptom of PTSD.

He turned to face the front again, and started as he found himself face to face with an unfamiliar man leaning against his front door.

The man's posture seemed relaxed, and he wasn't approaching John in a manner that seemed aggressive or dangerous, and yet there was something about him that made John's hair stand on end. He was waiting for John, which was made abundantly clear not only by the way that he was leaning against John's door, but also by the way he was looking at him. The man's eyes were bright, abnormally so, and John couldn't help but feel he was under scrutiny, as though the man was looking straight through him,  _into_  him, in a way that made John want to shrink back or avert his gaze.

However, John was a soldier, and he was not willing to back down, especially not to some stranger who had apparently followed him home. He squared his shoulders and kept his chin up high, doing his best to stand up tall and put as little weight on his cane as he could manage. "Can I help you?"

The stranger pushed off the door to straighten up, looking John up and down in a way that made him feel exposed, before saying, in what had to have been an intentionally ominous tone, "I know what you are."

John's hand tightened on his cane, and he did his best to swallow down the panic that rose in his chest. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said, and the stranger laughed.

"Oh,  _please_  don't play dumb. I was hoping for a marginally intellectually stimulating conversation." John stared, doing his best to ignore the way his heart was pounding in his chest, and the stranger continued, "Although I suppose I shouldn't have expected that much from something like you."

"What the Hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, simply that you creatures aren't exactly known for your intellect."

John's grip tightened on his cane to the point where his knuckles were beginning to turn white. "Look, I don't know who are-"

"No," the stranger interrupted, "but you should know what I am." John's incomprehension must have shown on his face, because the stranger added, "I'd wager you've never met a vampire before."

John's initial reaction was to scoff, to think that this stranger was playing some sort of game with him. However, with the events of Afghanistan, and the way that his whole world had turned upside-down, it wasn't nearly as unbelievable as it should be. He inhaled deeply through his nose again in an attempt to calm himself down, and was struck by the same, vile scent, like the scent of a dead animal left to rot.

"What do you want?" he said, only just managing to keep his voice steady.

The stranger shrugged. "Amusement, mostly. Anything to relieve the boredom."

"Yeah, well, find it somewhere else. I'm not interested." John locked his gaze on the door behind the stranger, and tried to step forward, to pass him and go inside and forget that this confrontation ever happened. The stranger, however, did not move to give him room.

"No, but you are interesting. At least, you're more interesting than a human, although that isn't really saying a lot." John tried to push past him, but the man held his ground, and continued, "Do you know you're the only werewolf in London?"

The word made him tense, and he resisted the urge to look around, to see if anyone was near enough to hear their conversation. He knew it didn't really matter, as he doubted anyone would believe a word of it if they did hear. If he'd walked past two men having a conversation like this, he definitely wouldn't have believed a word of it, had things been different. When he made no effort to respond, the stranger continued, "There's a good reason for that. Vampires are not nearly as territorial as you are, but that doesn't mean they would just leave you roaming around the city."

"Is that a threat?"

"Of course not. That would imply that I have some desire to kill you. I assure you, I despise the taste of wolf blood."

"How reassuring."

"Consider it a friendly warning," the stranger continued, as if John hadn't spoken.

"Yeah, I can take care of myself, thanks."

"If you encountered a vampire? I wouldn't hold out much hope. They'd have their fangs in your neck before you had time to bark."

"Great." John made an attempt to push past the stranger – vampire, he corrected in his head – and this time, the vampire allowed it. John pulled his key out of his pocket, sliding it into the lock. His hand, usually trembling, was perfectly still.

"I can see you're not going to listen to me," said the vampire.

"Great observation."

"It's your own choice, even if it is an idiotic one. It hardly concerns me if you turn up dead in a week."

"Wonderful. Are you done?"

There was a brief pause before the man behind him made a sound of affirmation. "Unless you get killed in the next twenty-four hours, I imagine I will be seeing you again, John Watson."

John's shoulders tensed further, his grip tightening on the door handle, before he turned around. "How the Hell do you know-" he began, but the vampire had already disappeared from sight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd just like to say a quick thank you to everyone who has commented, left kudos or subscribed to this story. It all really does mean a lot.


	4. Chapter 4

Sherlock was right in saying that he would see the werewolf again, but only because he made sure that this was the case. With no interesting cases for him to solve (the criminal class of London was such a disappointment), he found that he was easily distractible, constantly seeking entertainment in whatever form he could find it (be that experiments with body parts from the morgue, or puzzles with a Sudoku cube). He caught onto John Watson's scent when he passed the entrance to the Tube a few days after their first encounter, confirming what he had already known would be the case – the werewolf had not done the wise thing and left London in search of a new location less overrun by vampires. It also meant, however, that the werewolf was yet to be attacked by one of those vampires, so perhaps he was not quite as vulnerable as Sherlock had initially believed.

Either way, it meant that the werewolf was still around, and that meant that Sherlock had a way of amusing himself for the time being.

OoO

The second time Sherlock confronted John was shortly after the werewolf had left his flat in the morning, over a week after their first encounter. Judging by the route he was taking, he was on his way to the Tube, although it was impossible for Sherlock to tell to where the werewolf was heading without more data. Sherlock came up behind him as he was walking down the street, easily catching up with the man's limping strides, and he sped up his last couple of steps so that he came up beside him suddenly and without warning. "If I wanted to kill you, you'd be dead."

John stiffened in apparent surprise – Sherlock watched his shoulders tense and his grip tighten on his cane – before relaxing, in a way that suggested the action was forced. "Good thing you don't want to kill me, then."

"This merely proves my point, you realise. Should you be unfortunate enough to encounter a vampire who is more murderous than I am, you would be dead in a matter of seconds."

"I told you, I can take care of myself."

"So far, you've only given me reason to doubt that. I was able to sneak up on you without difficulty."

"Maybe I just knew it was you."

"I doubt that."

John didn't seem to have a response to that, and for a good moment both of them walked in silence before he spoke again. "You knew my name, last time we met. How?"

A smirk grew over Sherlock's face, and he turned his head away to hide it. "Mike Stamford."

"Mike told you about me?"

"Obviously. Surely you know the man well enough to know how open he can be."

John hummed. "Right, well, if you're going to stalk me, you might as well return the favour and tell me who you are."

"If I were stalking you, I'd have no reason to tell you anything. After all, isn't it beneficial for a 'stalker' to have a sense of anonymity?" John gave him a look, and he suppressed a grin, coming to a stop at the front of the entrance to the Tube. "This would be where you're heading, yes?"

John glanced at the entrance as if he hadn't realised how much distance they had just covered, and then looked back at Sherlock. "Right," he said, turning to head down the stairs. Sherlock let him get a few steps away before calling out behind him.

"The name's Sherlock Holmes," he said, and then he turned and walked away.

OoO

The third time they met was a couple of days later, one afternoon as John was on his way home from grocery shopping (evident from the plastic bags he was carrying). This time, when Sherlock came up beside him, John didn't flinch or stiffen in surprise. He merely glanced over at him and said, "Is this going to be a regular thing?"

Sherlock shrugged his shoulders. "If there's nothing better to do, perhaps. You heard me coming this time."

"Smelled you, more like. I take it you're responsible for the foul smell in the air."

"You're not much better, you realise. You smell like wet dog."

"Charming, you are." John paused for a moment, before continuing, "I looked you up on the internet. Found your website, The Science of Deduction."

Sherlock raised his eyebrows and looked over at him. "What did you think?"

John gave him a look. "You said you could identify a software designer by his tie and an airline pilot by his left thumb," he said in a tone of voice that portrayed scepticism. "You can't really, though. I mean, it's not clever observations like you say it is – it's because you're a vampire, isn't it?"

Sherlock frowned at him. "I can tell you're a military man because of your haircut and your posture. I can tell that you were stationed in Afghanistan from your suntan and the way that it stops at the wrists, and I can tell you were wounded in action, but your limp is psychosomatic, from the way that you walk. Judging by your association with Mike Stamford, it would not be a grand leap to assume you're a doctor – an army doctor, obviously – and you likely studied with him at St Bart's. This is all things I noticed the first time I saw you, not deductions that have been made over a period of time. Yes, my senses are enhanced, but none of this is invisible to the human eye. Humans are just idiots."

For a moment, John appeared too surprised to respond, and he merely blinked, before breathing, "That's amazing." He didn't give Sherlock enough time to formulate a response (which was a good thing, as Sherlock found himself momentarily speechless by the unusual compliment) before he asked, "How can you tell it was Afghanistan and not anywhere else?"

Sherlock smirked. "Well, I would have guessed either Afghanistan or Iraq, but finding your website last week helped."

OoO

These sorts of conversations did become a more common occurrence over the following couple of weeks, to the point where John almost seemed to expect it (even though Sherlock knew, logically, that he couldn't, as there was no consistent pattern to the days when Sherlock would meet with him). Additionally, John seemed increasingly intrigued by Sherlock, asking him questions about vampires in general, and about Sherlock himself. After Sherlock mentioned that he consulted for the police, John took an interest in the crimes that he investigated, and the means by which he solved them.

John, Sherlock was quick to discover, was more unusual than Sherlock had thought. Not only was he atypical for a werewolf, but he was also unusual in the way that he spoke to Sherlock. He didn't seem offended when Sherlock verbalised his deductions; he didn't tell him to go away or call him a freak. Instead, he would say things like "Amazing" and "Fantastic", and he would prompt Sherlock into elaborating, explaining how he had worked it all out. Sherlock had never had anyone he could really show off to before who didn't respond negatively, and although the compliments were predictable, each seemed to send an unusual feeling of pride through his body.

Occasionally, these conversations would occur over text, after Sherlock revealed that he had taken John's number from Mike's phone. The confession was initially met with dissatisfaction at the invasion of privacy, but this didn't seem to last very long, and then they were having conversations at three o'clock in the morning whenever John wasn't asleep. At this time of night, John seemed to be more open, more willing to answer Sherlock's questions. This was beneficial, as Sherlock was able to gather information about werewolves that he would not have been able to learn otherwise, and Sherlock was always happy to add any interesting information to his Mind Palace.

What was interesting was that Sherlock found himself beginning to look forward to the days when he would meet with John. As he consulted on cases (Detective Inspector Lestrade requested his assistance on a couple of cases that were too simple for his liking in the weeks that followed, and he was bored enough to offer his help) or made deductions, he found himself thinking about telling John about them in a few days' time, anticipating John's reactions with eagerness. He certainly would not consider John a friend, because vampires and werewolves could not be friends, and Sherlock Holmes did not have friends either way, but he couldn't deny the odd feeling in his stomach when he and John spoke.

OoO

As the full moon drew closer, Sherlock noticed the way John became increasingly agitated. Although he had become used to Sherlock's presence, unsurprised whenever he arrived, Sherlock noticed that he had become tenser as of late. The tone of conversations changed – John asked fewer open questions to keep the conversation going, and he wouldn't linger for even a moment when they arrived at his front door or the entrance to the Tube. He stopped calling Sherlock amazing, and started telling him to shut up whenever he made a deduction on any slightly personal matter.

Sherlock brought up the topic a week before the night in question. "Where are you planning on spending the full moon?"

It wasn't a personal question, but it caused John to stiffen nonetheless. "I don't really think that's any of your business, is it?"

"It could be."

"No, it couldn't. I might have self-control now, but if I met you during the full moon, I'd probably kill you."

Sherlock snorted. "You couldn't, even if you wanted to. You'd have the benefit of your size, yes, but you'd be acting on instincts. You wouldn't be able to anticipate my actions and respond to them. I'd have subdued you before you even had the chance to hurt me."

"You're so convinced that I wouldn't hurt you. I'd rather not put it to the test."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "If you say so. I don't want to know where you'll be so I can come find you, I assure you. Your smell is bad enough while you're human; I'd rather not come anywhere near you while you're a wolf. No, I want to know because I don't trust you to have found somewhere secure enough, and it would be a huge inconvenience to have an oversized dog roaming the streets of London. Humans are idiots, but I'm sure they're not quite stupid enough to ignore something like that."

John glared slightly, evidently unimpressed with the implied accusation that he would not be able to control himself, but Sherlock knew he wasn't wrong. John might have a remarkable amount of self-control so as to not have tried to attack Sherlock yet, but it didn't mean that he was going to be able to control himself under the influence of the full moon. After a moment, John answered, "Epping Forest. It's about half an hour outside of London by car; it should be far enough away for me to not hurt anyone."

Sherlock scoffed. "Not likely. You realise there are several visitor centres in the forest, yes? Even if half an hour was far enough away from London to avoid you causing harm to the people that live here, you're still far too close to people that you could hurt. This is ignoring the fact that you have all night to get back to London, and you creatures are fast."

"Do you have a better suggestion, then?"

Sherlock was silent for a moment in thought before he responded, "My brother's estate has a basement with a steel door, and chains if need be. I am absolutely certain that it could hold you."

John barked out a humourless laugh. "As if I'm going to spend the night locked up in a vampire's basement. I'm not an idiot, you know."

"Could have fooled me." John gave him a look, and Sherlock continued, "My brother despises getting his hands dirty. I assure you, you would be in no danger. It would merely ensure that you don't pose any risks to any unsuspecting humans."

"I think I'll pass, thanks," John replied as they turned to head up to his flat. "I'll find somewhere far enough away, trust me."

"I'm not holding out much hope," said Sherlock, and John turned to walk through his front door without a response. They didn't hear from each other in a few days.

OoO

It was a little after four o'clock in the morning, two days before the full moon, when Sherlock received a text.

          Does your offer about your brother's  
          basement still stand? - JW

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I go back to university next week, at which point posting will probably become more sporadic. I'll do what I can to write and post a chapter a week, but I apologise in advance if I suddenly disappear for several weeks.


	5. Chapter 5

John had very few memories of his first full moon. He had been in Afghanistan at the time, in the hospital ward beginning his recovery from the bullet wound to his shoulder. He could remember feeling tired, willing to try to get some sleep, and then he could remember waking up groggily, on the floor, several hours later. In between, the only thing he could remember was being in pain. Bill Murray had been able to fill him in on the details later.

Bill had been the nurse taking care of him when the change had happened. John had cried out in pain first; that was what had caught Bill's attention. The logical conclusion that Bill had drawn was that the problem was his shoulder, and he had been preparing to give John some more pain relief when John's body had started convulsing. It had looked as though it might have been a seizure at first, but Bill hadn't had time to give John anything for a seizure before he heard the first crack – the sound of John's bones breaking.

It was only natural that the sight of John's body twisting and contorting into shapes that should not have been humanly possible would send Bill into a state of shock, rendering him temporarily unable to help. Bill had expressed great guilt about this afterwards, when he was telling John about it – he had been able to hear John's cries of pain, and he felt guilty that he had done nothing to stop them. John didn't hold it against him, of course. Even the best nurses couldn't have been prepared for the sight.

There were stories, in Afghanistan – things they would tell each other when they lay awake at night. There were stories about wolves with dangerous bites, of men who suffered strange diseases as a result of being bitten. They would laugh at these stories, tell jokes about werewolves, but other than that, it would scarcely cross their minds. No one would really expect to see anything as fantastical as a human shifting into the form of an animal. However, with John's body twisting and changing, hair growing out of his skin, there was only so much that could be dismissed as a hallucination brought on by the war.

Bill explained that it was the sound that John made next – not a cry of pain, but a howl – that spurred him into action. He injected John with a sedative, and that seemed to calm him while the transformation was still occurring, but only a little. He ended up injecting him with more after the transformation was complete, with difficulty, and he managed to use enough to knock John out for the rest of the night. The amount he used could have been enough to kill a normal person, which explained why he looked so relieved when John came around late the following morning, sore and disoriented but otherwise unharmed.

So far, that was the only full moon that John had experienced, and he had been plagued with nightmares ever since of how he would cope without the sedation.

OoO

Sherlock's brother, Mycroft Holmes, sent a sleek black car to pick John up at about five o'clock in the afternoon leading up to the night of the full moon. John had been waiting for it for the entire day; he had been unable to focus or distract himself, finding himself constantly checking the time and the position of the sun in the sky. He had scarcely slept the night before, dreaming of pain and howls, of bones breaking and of human bodies being torn limb from limb. By the time the car pulled up on the side of the road, John was ready for the day to just be over.

He took with him a bag of clean clothes, knowing he would want something to change into when the night was over. The driver climbed out of the car when he stepped onto the footpath, opening the back door for him without a word. Inside, there was a young woman, pretty, who didn't so much as look up at him when he climbed in. She didn't smell like death like Sherlock did, but when she moved, her hair fell away from her neck to reveal two clean puncture wounds.

She made no effort to talk to him, and after a minute, John broke the silence. "Hello."

It took her a moment before she tore her gaze from the phone in her hands to look up at him, smiling. "Hi," she said, before promptly returning her gaze to her phone.

"What's your name, then?"

"Anthea."

John didn't miss the way she seemed to hesitate, to draw out the 'A' sound in a way that could be seen as um-ing and ah-ing. "Is that your real name?"

The woman smiled and replied, "No," and John's attention was drawn once again to the neat puncture wounds in her neck. He was beginning to contemplate the politeness of asking if she was a human or a vampire when his phone vibrated, and he shifted to pull it out of his pocket, opening up the latest message.

          Don't bother making conversation  
          with the walking blood bag.  
          SH

John frowned, but it wasn't difficult to work out to whom Sherlock was referring. He glanced at the woman who was not called Anthea out of the corner of his eye, and then typed out his response.

          Can you see me?

The reply came through quickly, followed by another, and it was easy to fall into a conversation when he was getting nowhere with the one in the car.

          No, but I know the way you  
          react to the presence of an  
          aesthetically pleasing female.  
          SH

          She's not going to want much  
          to do with you. Vampire venom  
          tends to have that effect on  
          people.  
          SH

          What do you mean?

          Vampire venom is like a drug  
          for humans. Gives them a high  
          and causes an attachment to form  
          after prolonged exposure.  
          Evolutionary advantage of having  
          our prey coming back for more.  
          SH

          You get all the evolutionary  
          advantages. What's the benefit  
          of turning into a wolf once a month?

          You have got the advantage of  
          enhanced strength and senses,  
          though it does not surprise me  
          that you don't care for that.  
          SH

          Enhanced strength and senses,  
          and once a month I turn into  
          a monster with no control. I'd  
          rather be human.

          No point in complaining. It won't  
          change it.  
          SH

          I doubt my brother will want to  
          talk to you, but if he does, please  
          ask him about his diet. Or call  
          him whatever name you please.  
          SH

          I take it you and him don't get  
          on?

          He's a fat git who thinks he  
          can control everything. He  
          doesn't exactly get along with  
          anyone.  
          SH

          Unimportant. You probably  
          won't meet him anyway.  
          SH

          Walking Blood Bag can chain you  
          up.  
          SH

          No. No chains.

          You said it was a steel door. I'll  
          be fine without chains.

          Suit yourself. The option stands  
          should you change your mind.  
          SH

"Sir?"

John looked up from his phone, finger hovering over the keys to type out a message, before he realised that the car had pulled to a stop on the driveway to a large house. Well, the word "house" didn't quite seem adequate, especially in comparison to the army bed sit that John had been stuck living in. "Mansion" would be a better word. It looked like something out of a movie; two storeys high and with more rooms than anyone would ever need. It took all of John's willpower not to gape at the sight of it.

"We're here," said Not-Anthea, as the driver climbed out of the car and opened the door for John. It felt wrong, to be standing on a driveway of a place like this dressed as casually as he was, but he did his best to not let himself look insecure or uncertain. Sherlock had offered him a place to spend the full moon; it wasn't as though he was actually out of place there. It was only for one night, and he was about to spend the entirety of that night in the basement of this building as an animal who wouldn't remember anything the following morning.

The driver stayed by the car, but Not-Anthea led him to the house, and John did his best not to stare as she unlocked the front door, gesturing for him to step inside. Unsurprisingly, the interior was just as nice, if not nicer, as the outside of the house, and all he could see was the front hallway. The floor was shiny, enough for him to be able to see his reflection in it, and he wondered if he should take his shoes off so as to not dirty it. He decided against it as Not-Anthea walked past him without doing so herself, and he followed her halfway down the shiny hallway to a door on the left.

This door was unlocked not with a key, but with a four-digit code, typed in to a pin-pad next to the wall. John resisted the urge to stare as she unlocked it, although she pressed the buttons too fast for him to be able to tell what numbers she pressed. The door swung open to reveal a narrow staircase, leading into the darkness below. "This way," she said, and John followed her down, careful not to trip until she turned on the light switch at the bottom.

The basement was nowhere near as clean or as well-furbished as the hallway upstairs. Mycroft's assistant led him down the narrow hall to the last door at the end – as Sherlock had said, this one was made of steel, and it slid open automatically when the woman inserted a key into the hole on the wall beside it. The room behind it looked incredibly bare in contrast to the automatic door that led to it – it was empty except for iron chains attached to the far wall, and lit only by a dull light bulb on the roof. "Why on Earth does your boss have a place like this beneath his house?" he said, but Not-Anthea did not reply, instead simply standing to the side and letting John enter.

"I will come and get you at sunrise," she said as he walked past her. "Will you need anything else?"

"No," John answered, and then, on second thoughts, added, "Actually, could I get you to take these for me?" He handed her the plastic bag full of clothing, which she took, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket and added it to the pile. "Probably better that I don't have anything in the room I might destroy." He cracked a half-smile, but she did not mirror it.

"Is that all?"

John's smile faded, and he looked around the room once more before nodding his head. "Yeah."

He saw her slide the key into the wall again and turn it, and the door slid shut between them.

Once alone, John spent a short while pacing the perimeter of the basement, getting used to the size and shape of it and ensuring that there was no way that he could get out once he had shifted. It didn't surprise him that there wasn't. He paced from one wall to the other, counting the number of steps between them as he waited for the sun to set in the sky. Without a watch or windows, he had no way of telling how late it was, but he could feel himself becoming increasingly restless and agitated the later it got. He had no way of telling if that was the wolf preparing for the shift, or simply his own anxiety, but he couldn't help but feel like it was the former.

When he felt like it was late enough, he undressed, folding his clothes neatly into a pile on the floor even though he doubted anything in this basement would be neat by the time the sun rose again. Still, at least if they were on the floor they had a chance of still being in one piece by the morning. He shivered at the cool air against his skin, sitting down in the middle of the basement and wrapping his arms around himself. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and waited.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains mentions of drug use. Please avoid the middle section if you are worried about how this might affect you.
> 
> On an unrelated note, thank you all so much for all the response this fic has been given so far. It means a lot.

The change began when the clock struck midnight.

John couldn't see what time it was, of course, but he could tell when it was about to start. Ever since he had been bitten, it had felt as though the Wolf had made a home somewhere in John's mind. It wasn't always active but it was always there. It would awaken when he was angry, or when he was afraid, and as the full moon grew closer, it would wake more easily. It felt as though it could influence him, influence the way he responded to different situations, and the closer to the full moon it got, the harder it became to ignore. Now, as the moon rose into the sky, it felt as though the Wolf was pacing in his mind, growing stronger, more restless.

John could tell when the change was about to begin, because inside his mind, the Wolf howled, and the pain started less than a minute later.

When the bullet had torn through his shoulder in Afghanistan, it had hurt. It hadn't at first, for a moment; he was in shock, and it wasn't until he heard someone yell his name that he realised that he had been hit. He had seen the blood on his leg first (not his, but he hadn't known that at the time) and he had gone to move, to cover the wound in a rush of adrenaline. The pain had started the moment he realised why he couldn't move his arm. It had been excruciating. His shoulder burned as though it was on fire, and he was sure that he was going to die, begging a God that he wasn't sure existed to let him stay alive. It had been all he could think about – he hadn't noticed the sound of footsteps racing towards him, hardly registering the pain of a bite.

At that point in time, it was the worst pain he had ever experienced. It was  _nothing_  compared to shifting.

John could feel every bone in his body breaking and reshaping, twisting and contorting into unnatural shapes and positions. He could hear each snap and crunch, over the sound of his screams and cries in the silence of the basement. Each shout echoed off the walls, ringing in his ears; every sound seemed too loud, too overwhelming. His skin pulled and stretched over the reforming bones, itching as fur began to lengthen and grow. When his spinal cord snapped, he let out a yell, and then, for one blissful moment, there was nothing, no pain below the break. Then the bones joined together again, and the pain started afresh.

It felt as though he should have been weak, when it finally finished. It felt as though he should have collapsed on the cold basement floor without the strength to get up, every muscle in his body burning as if he had run a marathon the day before. At very least, it felt as though he should need at least a few minutes to recover, to lie there and pant until the pain of changing faded away.

None of this happened. The Wolf was alive, and awake, and did not want to be trapped in a basement where he could not run free.

Then he inhaled through his nose and was struck by the overwhelming scent of one pale, dark haired vampire, filling the basement prison with his mark, and that made the Wolf very, very angry indeed.

OoO

**September, 1888**

"You really must be more careful, brother."

Sherlock pulled away from the neck of the young female he had chosen for that evening, blood running down his chin. The woman had scarcely enough blood left in her body to stay conscious, and she swayed even in Sherlock's grip. Granted, she hadn't been particularly steady on her feet to start off with. Sherlock had been able to smell the heroin in her system before he'd let his fangs extend from his mouth; it had been what drew him to her to start. By now, she would be riding the waves of pleasure from his venom, regarding she was still conscious enough to experience it.

He lifted a finger to his chin and wiped up the blood that had spilled from his mouth, glaring at his brother as he did. "I hardly need to do anything,  _brother_ ," he replied, spitting the word as if it left a bad taste in his mouth. He let go of the human, letting her collapse onto the cold pavement, and he lifted his finger to his lips, sucking the blood off.

"You're being careless, Sherlock," said Mycroft, glancing down at the nearly unconscious woman before looking back to his brother. "You're risking exposure, not to mention the damage you are doing to yourself."

"Well, that's your problem." Already, he was beginning to feel the pleasant buzz of heroin. It wasn't the cocaine that he craved, but it was definitely satisfying. "If you are so afraid of exposure, you can clean up my mess."

"It's not simply exposure that I am concerned for." Once again, he glanced down at the woman, and Sherlock followed his gaze. It appeared that he had not taken as much blood as he usually did – she was unconscious, but he could still see the shallow rise and fall of her chest, and he could still hear her weak heartbeat.

"She's hardly worth your concern, Mycroft," he said, even though he knew that was not what his brother had been talking about. "She won't remember any of this even if she does survive the night. She will blame the heroin; she was near to falling into unconsciousness before I approached her."

"I don't believe that was the heroin."

Sherlock frowned, staring at his brother in confusion. Was his mind working slower than usual? Why was he failing to make sense of what his brother was saying? Mycroft was giving him a knowing look, and Sherlock couldn't understand what that meant.

Was the ground getting closer?

"Oh, you bastard," he spat as his side hit the footpath. He tried to push himself back up again, and found he didn't have the strength.

"Slow acting sedative," Mycroft explained as he struggled against the exhaustion already pulling at his muscles and his eyelids. "I knew you would be likely to feed from her, and I knew I could not inject you with it directly. Admittedly, I feared that you might smell it on her, but I doubted you would recognise the smell over the heroin."

Sherlock tried to spit another insult, another cuss word, but found his mouth would not co-operate. He hadn't experienced exhaustion since he was human, when he still required the occasional night's sleep to operate properly. Darkness licked at the corners of his vision, and he tried to force his eyes open, to glare at his brother, who was staring down at him.

"It's for your own good, Sherlock," Mycroft said, and then the darkness consumed him.

OoO

Sherlock had no idea how much time had passed when he finally woke up again, muscles feeling stiff and unused. His face was pressed into cold, hard ground, and he thought for a moment that he was still on the pavement where he had fallen, before he realised that it was too quiet for him to still be in the streets. He blinked several times as his eyes focussed to the dull light, and he let out a slight groan as he tried to move. He managed to turn his head so that his cheek rested against the ground, and he found himself face to face with a pair of familiar, shiny, black shoes.

"You drugged me," he slurred, tongue feeling heavy in his mouth.

"Stating the obvious, Sherlock," Mycroft replied in that condescending tone of voice that Sherlock had always despised. "You must still be coming around."

"You had no right to drug me."

"As I said, brother dear, it's for your own benefit. You certainly aren't going to lower the amount of blood you drink by yourself."

Sherlock let out a humourless laugh. "So this is your way of making me do so? Sedating me so that you can lecture me while I am unable to run away?"

"Of course not. You'd not listen to me regardless of whether or not you can leave. No, Sherlock, I believe I need to wean you off of it."

Expression caught somewhere between a frown and a scowl, Sherlock managed (with some difficulty) to push himself into a sitting position so that he could properly take in his surroundings. He didn't recognise the room that they were in. It was completely bare, except for what looked to be chains, attached to one wall. The door was sealed shut. He looked back at Mycroft and said, incredulously, "You're planning on locking me up?"

"It's the only way I can ensure you won't feed more than I allow you," said Mycroft. "You will get your next meal when the heroin is completely out of your system."

He walked past Sherlock, heading towards the door. The younger vampire watched him go, watched him unlock the door with a large key, and saw the long, narrow hallway behind it. This was good – it wasn't a maze that he would have to navigate. Pushing past his brother would be easy, and then he would be free.

He pushed himself to his feet suddenly, and did not manage even a single step before he found himself back on the floor. Mycroft glanced over his shoulder.

"You'll have your strength back in another hour or so," he said. "However, you may be weaker than usual while your body becomes accustomed to feeding less than you're used to."

The door fell shut behind him, and Sherlock could hear the sound of the lock clicking, trapping him inside.

OoO

**Present Day**

John's entire body ached when he came around the following morning. He knew what had happened, of course – there was no moment when he woke, still groggy from sleep, when he didn't remember where he was or why he was there - but the memories of the night were fuzzy and unclear. He could remember feelings - the physical pain, and the emotional rage – but other than that, the night was a black spot in his memory.

He groaned as he pushed himself upright so that he could survey his surroundings. Aside from the pain in his muscles from the shift itself, he could see his body was littered with bruises and scratches. It took him a moment to work out how they had happened – the scratches on the walls told him that he had tried to escape, and he had probably pushed himself against the wall or the door in an attempt to do so. He could remember feeling trapped, almost claustrophobic, which came as no surprise.

His shirt had not survived the night – he could see pieces of fabric strewn about the basement everywhere. His trousers were torn at the bottom of one leg, and the other had one messy tear that looked like it had come from a sharp claw, but they were still wearable (not in public, certainly, but at least he could preserve some of his dignity when Mycroft's assistant came to find him). He put them on with difficulty, groaning with pain as his muscles protested. He picked up the shreds that were once his shirt, glad he had thought to wear one that he wouldn't mind losing too much, and then he collapsed back onto the floor and leaned back against the wall.

The time it took for Mycroft's assistant to come down was long enough for John to begin to drift off again, and he started awake at the sound of the door. The woman stepped in – John felt so worn out, he couldn't even remember her name – and handed him his clean pile of clothing. She turned away while he dressed, and turned back when he told her he was finished. Now that he got a better look at her, he noticed that she looked paler than she did yesterday, and with an oddly serene expression on her face. John could remember what Sherlock had said yesterday about vampire venom, and he wondered if, beneath her hair, the marks on her neck were fresher.

"I'm to take you home," she said. "Ready to go?"

John nodded his head weakly, and followed her back up the stairs.


	7. Chapter 7

          Survived the night?  
          SH

The text came through just as the car was pulling up to the side of the road outside John's flat, but John didn't check his phone until after he was inside. He was exhausted, and he wanted nothing more than to collapse onto his bed and sleep for at least a day, despite the fact that he had been incapable of sleeping through the night ever since he returned home from Afghanistan. It was tempting to ignore the phone that vibrated in his pocket, but he pulled it out after a moment to see if it was anything important, and once he had checked it he decided he might as well respond.

          More or less.

          I didn't promise that you  
          would have a pleasant night.  
          I merely guaranteed that it  
          would keep you from doing  
          any damage.  
          SH

          Yeah, thanks. The wolf didn't  
          like being locked up, especially  
          not where it smelt like vampire.

          Intriguing that you talk about 'the  
          wolf' as if it's a separate entity.  
          SH

          I'm sure my brother's scent is  
          quite disgusting. It doesn't surprise  
          me that you would not enjoy it.  
          SH

          Wasn't your brother. Smelt like you.

          Is that so? Interesting.  
          SH

          Why?

          Why is it interesting, or why does  
          my brother's basement smell like  
          me?  
          SH

          Both, I guess.

          It smells like me because I have  
          spent some time in there in the  
          past. It is interesting because  
          that was some time ago. I'd not  
          realised my scent would linger.  
          SH

          Why were you spending time in  
          a basement?

          Hardly an interesting story. I'd  
          much rather hear about your  
          night.  
          SH

          Not interesting either. Long,  
          tiring and painful.

          How long does shifting take?  
          SH

          I don't know. A little while.

          Interesting. Well, you may be  
          reassured to know that it  
          becomes easier with time.  
          SH

          And you'd be an expert on  
          werewolves, would you?

          I know that those I've met in the  
          past have shifted in response to  
          my scent, and that could not have  
          taken them more than a matter  
          of seconds.  
          SH

          Great. So, maybe in a few years'  
          time I won't be in so much pain  
          once a month.

          Perhaps you should try  
          shifting of your own accord. If you  
          do it enough I'm sure your body  
          will become faster at it.  
          SH

          Hah, funny. Easy for you to say, you're  
          not the one who would be in  
          excruciating pain.

          For a while, yes, but it would be more  
          beneficial for you in the long run.  
          SH

          Yeah, no.

          You're being foolish. This is logical.  
          You would benefit from being able  
          to control yourself.  
          SH

          I can control myself fine.

          And you could control yourself  
          more if you could shift on  
          command.  
          SH

          I'm tired. Goodnight.

          John.  
          SH

John didn't reply, tossing his phone down on the bed and closing his eyes. With the exhaustion pulling at his mind, it didn't take him long to drift off into unconsciousness.

OoO

In some stories, there is a rule that vampires cannot enter a building without being verbally invited in by the owner. This is incorrect, which was convenient for Sherlock, because it would be very difficult to search for evidence in a house of a potential murderer if he had to ask that potential murderer for permission to enter. However, when it came to his older brother, Sherlock had always wished that he could keep the man out of his flat simply by saying, "No, you cannot come in."

He had expected Mycroft to turn up after he allowed John to use his basement, presumably seeing it as an invitation for communication with Sherlock. He would probably see it as a favour that Sherlock should owe him, and he would undoubtedly have some dull job for Sherlock to do to repay him. However, Sherlock had held onto hope that he might not have to speak to Mycroft for at least a few days before the man inevitably thought it was time to stick his oversized nose into Sherlock's business.

Quite unfortunately, Mycroft's oversized nose ended up poking through the door of the Baker Street flat only half an hour or so after John had decided to stop replying to Sherlock's texts. Sherlock could hear him when his landlady opened the door downstairs (perhaps he would not be able to escape Mycroft even if vampires could not enter a building without permission, because Mrs Hudson was far too open and far too trusting). He briefly considered jumping out the window to avoid a conversation, but Mycroft reached the top of the stairs before he had time to execute his plan.

"Really, Sherlock," he said as he stepped through the doorway, looking down his nose at the state of the flat. "Does Mrs Hudson appreciate you making such a mess of the place?"

Sherlock picked up his violin case and brought it over to his usual chair, sitting down and pulling out the bow and a cloth so that he could clean it. The instrument was not in need of a clean, but if he was watching his hand move over the bow, he did not have to look at his brother. "Let's make this quick, Mycroft," he said. "You're not here on a social visit; you're here to ask a favour in return for letting John use your basement. You undoubtedly have a job for me in your file." He pointed to the folder beneath Mycroft's arm with his bow before returning to cleaning it.

"Ah, yes, John Watson," said Mycroft, as if he had only paid attention to a portion of what Sherlock said. "An unusual character, isn't he? Interesting that you've chosen to befriend a werewolf."

"He's not my friend, Mycroft."

"Of course not. You merely offered him a place to spend the full moon out of boredom, did you?"

"It was convenient. Surely you wouldn't have preferred having to cover the tracks of a bloodthirsty werewolf."

Mycroft hummed. "Do be careful, Sherlock," he said. "Let's not forget what happened to Victor."

Sherlock looked up from his bow to glare at his brother. "Hurry up, Mycroft. What is it that you want me to do?"

Mycroft moved over to the table at the side of the room, placing the folder down on top of it. "There have been reports of a hunter making his way through Britain," he explained. "He was last sighted in York, and I believe he may be gradually heading towards London. I would like you to track him, and ensure that he does not pose a risk here."

"A hunter? Dull."

"Maybe so, Sherlock, but I'm sure you are aware of the risk that hunters pose to us."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "If he arrives in London, I will take care of it. Go home, Mycroft. Don't you have a country to run?"

Mycroft opened his mouth to respond, and Sherlock quickly lifted his violin to its place beneath his chin, running the bow over the strings in a way to produce a screeching noise to drown out the sound of his voice. After a couple of minutes of this, Mycroft took the hint, and he turned and headed back out the door.

OoO

Sherlock didn't hear from John at all for the rest of the day, so he made sure to head over to John's flat bright and early the following morning, in order to catch him before he headed off to wherever his destination was that day. He arrived there around the same time that he usually did, around the time that John usually left his house. He knew John didn't have a job (the times he came home, for one thing, were too irregular, and John wouldn't be living in a tiny little army bedsit if he was earning money rather than living on an army pension), but yet he was a man of routine, which came as no surprise given his military history. John's day started at the same time every day, like clockwork, and so, when John failed to come out of his flat for ten whole minutes after his usual time, it struck Sherlock as incredibly odd. He wondered briefly if John had left earlier than usual, but the scent on the footpath outside of the door was too weak to be new. So, Sherlock decided that there were more productive things he could be doing than standing outside waiting.

He pressed the buzzer for the doorbell, waited two seconds, and then pressed it again twice for good measure. When this failed to bring John downstairs, he knocked three times on the door, and then pressed the buzzer again. He repeated this twice before the door finally opened, revealing one very frustrated-looking John Watson. He was still dressed in his pyjamas, hair messy, and despite how late it was in the morning, he was still looking tired. He glared at Sherlock as he opened the door. "You know, when someone doesn't answer the door the first time you ring the bell, it might mean that they're sleeping, and probably want to be left doing just that."

"You never sleep this late," Sherlock stated. "You should have been awake by now."

John gave him a look. "When you have all of your bones broken and restructured twice in one night, you can talk to me."

"That was two nights ago. You had all of yesterday to sleep it off."

John let out a frustrated sigh, lifting a hand to his face and rubbing his eyes. "I'm not going to get any more sleep this morning, am I?" he muttered. "Right. I need tea."

He turned to make his way back up into his flat, and that was a good enough invitation for Sherlock to follow.

John's flat was scarcely good enough to be considered a flat, but Sherlock hadn't had high expectations. He scanned around the few rooms briefly, taking in everything he could in a short space of time. The bed was unmade, but John was already moving over to fix that up as Sherlock took in the room. This was undoubtedly a habit from his army days, and the fact that it wasn't made already confirmed what Sherlock had already hypothesized – John had only just gotten out of bed. The state of the bed also suggested restless sleep.

There was a cup in the sink, filled with water – John had had a cup of tea yesterday, but had left the cup to soak rather than choosing to clean it up. That must have been unusual – John was a tidy person generally, given the state of his flat. However, the fact that he'd not cleaned up last night was no surprise, given how tired he had claimed to be. John always smelt faintly of tea – clearly it was something he had a lot of, likely more when he was emotional when he needed some sort of comfort or some way to calm down. He must have been worked up after shifting, in need of the calming drink, but still too tired to wash up properly.

John finished making his bed, and walked over to the kitchen (which could not be called a kitchen; it was a counter at the side of the room with some necessary appliances on it) to put the kettle on. "Did you want..." he started, and then cut himself off, frowning slightly, before asking, "Vampires wouldn't really drink tea, would they?"

"We can eat and drink, but we do not require it. We don't get anything out of it except for the taste, which is nothing special in comparison to blood."

"Right. Well, did you want tea?"

Sherlock's lip quirked slightly, and he shook his head. "No."

John nodded once, taking out a mug from the cupboard rather than cleaning the one that was still in the sink, and he took an Earl Grey tea bag from a box in the other cupboard. "Right. So, why did you think it was a good idea to wake me up?" he asked, looking over at Sherlock while he waited for the kettle to boil. "Did you want something?"

Sherlock shrugged. "You weren't texting me, and I was bored. Besides, I'm interested. I've seen werewolves shift before, but you would be the only one willing to really explain it to me.

"Who said I was willing to explain it to you?"

Sherlock cocked his head to one side. "Well, you're the only werewolf who hasn't lunged at my throat, so I figure you're the most likely."

John smirked slightly at that. The kettle boiled, and he poured hot water into his cup. "All right," he said after a moment, jiggling the tea bag around in the water. "What do you want to know?"


	8. Chapter 8

Sherlock managed to reign in his excitement until John had finished making his tea and was leaning back against the kitchen counter. His flat didn't have a sofa or a table, and the desk was only big enough for one, so there was no convenient spot for them to sit and have a nice chat. Sherlock wasn't concerned, however; he was more than happy to stand, and when it became apparent that John didn't mind doing the same, the questions started pouring out of his mouth.

"I've seen werewolves change before – I know the way your bodies restructure themselves. I want to know what goes on inside, what happens in your head. Can you still think in the same way that you can in your human form? Are you conscious of what is going on around you? Does your brain work more like an animal's would, or are you still essentially human in thought, and simply in an animal's body?"

"You've had time to think about this, haven't you?" John raised his eyebrows, a faint smile playing at the corner of his mouth. "Um, I don't think I can answer your questions. Whether or not I'm conscious of what's going on around me, I don't know, but it's all fuzzy the next morning. I probably can't think properly, though, because if I could I doubt I'd be throwing myself at a steel door to try to escape."

"You remember trying to escape?"

John shook his head. "Not really. I just know it's something the Wolf would do."

"You're still referring to 'the Wolf' as if it is something separate from you."

"Well, it is. I'm not some bloodthirsty animal." – Sherlock made a sceptical sound but John ignored him – "I'm human, and the Wolf sort of… exists in my mind, and comes out closer to the full moon."

"Wrong."

"Excuse me?" John raised his eyebrows at the vampire, and Sherlock could see his body language change immediately, becoming defensive.

"You're not human, John. You've not been human since you were in Afghanistan. You are a werewolf; 'the Wolf', as you refer to it, is merely the more instinctual side of who you are, not a separate thing to you."

"And you'd know this better than I do, would you? You'd know exactly what's going on in my own head."

"You want it to be separate from you. You want to believe that that isn't you, that you're still, more or less, the person you were before you were bitten. Telling yourself that 'the Wolf' isn't you is a coping mechanism, nothing more."

"I think I'd know the difference between making something up as a coping mechanism and the actual situation."

"No, you wouldn't, your emotions would blind you."

John put his half-finished cup of tea down on the counter, and Sherlock could see that the things he was saying were getting to the other man. John's shoulders were squared and his head held high in a military-like stance - he was falling back into old habits defensively - and his mouth was set in a hard line. He was silent for a moment, perhaps trying to form a coherent argument against what Sherlock was saying, but eventually he decided against even trying. "I don't have to deal with this," he said. "I really do not care what you think, go entertain yourself somewhere else. Find some human to feed on."

"I don't feed on humans."

John's posture didn't change, but Sherlock heard his heart rate pick up just the tiniest bit. "What do you feed on, then?"

"Blood bags," Sherlock replied, and John relaxed a miniscule amount. "Infinitely more convenient than having to find someone to feed on without being noticed, or having to deal with a regular feeder."

"Right. Whatever. Just… piss off. I'm not dealing with this today."

"Honestly, John, you shouldn't let…"

"I said piss off, Sherlock." John didn't raise his voice, but his tone was firm, and although he kept his voice steady there was an underlying hint of anger. Sherlock waited for a moment, holding John's gaze as if to challenge him, before he brushed past the werewolf and saw his own way out.

John had been affected by what Sherlock had been saying. He had been hurt by it, angered by it, in a way that meant his emotions were ruling over his brain. Yet he hadn't shown a single sign, not one, of being on the verge of shifting.

OoO

Sherlock didn't hear from John for three days. This was partially because John spent a couple of days at home recovering – Sherlock was able to tell this by judging the strength of the werewolf's scent outside his flat and at the Tube; it was too weak for him to have been there recently – and partially because Sherlock found himself investigating a locked room murder that held his attention for a full day and a half before he solved it.

Finding himself bored a matter of hours after solving the case, he decided it was time to see if John had stopped hiding away from the world and had returned to his normal routine. It came as no real surprise that he had;.Sherlock found him as he exited the Tube station that afternoon. The vampire's gaze flickered over him briefly, taking in the smart button up shirt and neatly combed hair.

"Job interview?" he asked, falling into step beside him easily.

John glanced over at him without breaking his stride. "Was beginning to wonder when you'd turn up again," he said, without a hint of malice in his tone that would have suggested he was still harbouring hurt feelings from their last conversation. "Yeah, just down at a clinic."

"You got the job, obviously."

"You know, some people find out these things by having a proper conversation."

"We are having a proper conversation."

"I mean one where you ask questions and get answers, not one where you come up and answer the questions yourself."

"Dull. Do you really think you could hold down a stable place of employment with your... condition?"

John looked around briefly before responding – Sherlock knew he was trying to work out how many people were within hearing range and could overhear their conversation. It was amusing, more than anything else, seeing how worried the werewolf was about such a petty thing like that. Sherlock knew when to use certain words to avoid drawing attention, but even when people could overhear their conversations, most had a tendency to ignore it, to shrug it off even though the topic in question sounded fantastical. People tended to assume normality – they would make excuses in their head, make sense of a nonsensical situation. People rarely came to the conclusion that they were overhearing a conversation by two creatures believed only to exist in fairy tales and horror films (and the occasional bad romance novel).

"Yes, actually," he said after a moment (apparently satisfied that there were no risks with having this conversation now). "I'm human most of the time, and this isn't going to stop me from getting a job."

"You're not human most of the time," said Sherlock, and he kept talking before John could protest. "You're a werewolf all of the time."

"Fine, I look human most of the time. I'll manage."

"Won't your boss become suspicious when you have to take a few days off every month, at around the same time?"

"It's not a permanent position yet, and it's not full time. I'll cross that bridge when I get there."

"What about the stress that comes with being a doctor? You're not the same man you were in Afghanistan. How can you be expected to cope with the pressure without shifting?"

"I'll manage." John's voice sounded tight and firm, but calm, without the anger that Sherlock had heard the last time they had spoken like this.

"You're in a much better mood than the last time I spoke to you," Sherlock commented.

"The last time you spoke to me, I was overtired and irritable. I'd apologise for the way I spoke to you, but, to be fair, you did kind of deserve it."

"I was only being realistic."

"Yeah, we're not having this discussion. Come on, I'm starving and would like to get home and have something to eat."

OoO

John's lycanthropy came up in conversation again about a week later, one afternoon after John's shift at the clinic. John had chosen to take a cab instead of the Tube, but when he found Sherlock waiting outside his flat when the cab pulled up, he decided to let the vampire inside while he made himself something for dinner. It was another way in which John was unusual, Sherlock thought – werewolves were known to be territorial, but yet John was easily letting a vampire into his territory. It should have caused an instinctual reaction, the smell of vampire in John's own home, and yet John did not look the faintest bit concerned.

"Should I expect to find you taking cabs more often now that you have a job that allows you to afford it?" Sherlock asked as he wandered around John's room, taking in everything that had changed since the last time he was here (which was essentially nothing – the flat was so bare it hardly looked lived in at all). After a moment, he seated himself on the edge of John's desk, watching as the werewolf went through his cupboard and pulled out a can of vegetable soup.

"Probably not. I don't have regular enough shifts yet to afford doing it every time. It'll probably just be when I don't want to walk too far."

"Because of your psychosomatic limp," Sherlock finished, emphasising the second last word.

John pursed his lips. "It's not psychosomatic, you know. I did get shot."

"Yes, in the shoulder, which has absolutely no impact on the way you walk."

"Well, obviously it does, otherwise I wouldn't be limping."

"You're limping because your leg hurts, because you have a psychosomatic leg injury. Perhaps if you would just accept that I'm right, that will go away. There are a few matters on which you should accept that I'm right, really."

"Yes, because you know more about my injury and werewolves than I do," John muttered, glancing over his shoulder at Sherlock and rolling his eyes before he returned his gaze to the stovetop.

"Do you limp when you're in wolf form?"

That seemed to make John think, given the way he paused for a moment before he continued to stir his soup around. "I don't know," he said. "Probably, given that injuries exist on whatever form I'm in."

"Wrong," Sherlock said, and before John could protest, he elaborated, "No, not about the injuries, you're right about that much. You don't limp in wolf form, because wolves don't have psychosomatic injuries."

"And you know this for certain, do you? You've seen me in wolf form?" John froze slightly after saying it, and glanced over his shoulder. "You weren't spying on me when I used your brother's basement, were you?"

"No, of course not." Sherlock made a dismissive hand gesture. "Well, Mycroft might have been – he does love security cameras – but I've not been granted access to any footage of you from that night. However, I know that your injury is psychosomatic, and I know that animals do not have psychosomatic injuries, so it's not a grand leap to deduce that you don't limp when you're a wolf."

"Look, I get that you're clever, but I'm pretty sure I might have a little bit more knowledge about myself than you do."

"Well..."

"No."

Sherlock sighed, looking around the room for a moment before he let his gaze return to John. "You really should shift voluntarily. Not only would it prove my point that you do not limp in wolf form – which would benefit you, because perhaps your silly little mind would realise that the injury is psychosomatic and you'd stop feeling it – but you could let yourself become stronger and faster at shifting, and better at controlling yourself in that form."

"I'm pretty sure we've had this conversation already."

"Yes, when you were overtired and emotional. I thought that perhaps your decision would have changed, now that you're capable of thinking logically."

"Well, you thought wrong. I'm not shifting any more than I need to."

"You're only making this harder on yourself in the long run."

"No, I'm making it easier, because I'm making sure I don't have to suffer more than one night a month."

"You'll never learn to control yourself."

"I said no." John all but cut him off, shooting a glare over his shoulder before he took the saucepan off the heat and began pouring his soup into a bowl. "And as that really doesn't make a difference to you, I suggest you get over it and find something else to talk about, or you can go spend the rest of the night back at your place, or wherever else it is that you vampires got at night."

Sherlock complied, changing the subject, but the thought still lingered in the back of his mind.

OoO

Sherlock had always had an addictive personality and a tendency towards obsessions. Something could catch his attention, and he would fixate on it, focussing on nothing else for weeks, months, or maybe even years. The drugs, the blood, even the crimes he investigated were proof of that – give him an interesting case, and he would forget to feed or sleep or simply do anything outside of working on solving the mystery.

Somehow, John had become a mystery that needed to be solved, something for him to fixate on and be obsessed with. John was unusually controlled, especially for such a young werewolf, and Sherlock wanted to see that control break. He wanted to see what made John Watson snap, what it would take for him to lose control and shift on a different night to the full moon.

Sherlock justified that it would be beneficial for John as well – the werewolf had been too stubborn to agree that learning to shift on command, letting his body become used to shifting, would make the entire process easier. Perhaps it would help John's mind as well as his body – perhaps if he controlled himself, he would become more conscious during the nights of the full moon, and he could learn to control himself in his wolf form.

In between cases, it wasn't as though there was anything else for him to do. He had no interest in helping Mycroft with his hunter problem, and besides, it wasn't as though this hunter was going to arrive in London immediately. In contrast to the eternity that Sherlock could live for, the werewolf's life span was short, and Sherlock decided that he might as well take advantage of this source of amusement while he could. And so, Sherlock became obsessed with the idea of making John lose control.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains a couple of tiny mentions of drug use. 
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has subscribed to, bookmarked or left kudos on this story, and especially to those who have commented. I honestly cannot explain how much it means to me.

Since he had been turned, Sherlock had come across a number of werewolves. Most of the time, he'd steer clear of them – he would spend less time in the more heavily populated areas, and he generally made an effort to stay away from places that smelt of packs and their territory. However, there had been times – three of them, to be precise – when he had encountered a werewolf and had been unable to keep his distance. Those encounters were part of the reason why he took such precautions in avoiding the creatures.

The first encounter had come to pass a matter of months after Sherlock had been turned. He did not have the clearest memory of it – he did not have many clear memories from that time, permanently lost in a state of blood lust, high on both the blood and the drugs coursing through his victims' veins. However, he could remember enough to know what had occurred, and reluctant conversations with Mycroft confirmed that these memories were correct. The werewolf in question had only been young, bitten no more than a matter of months ago, and although Sherlock refused to consider the alternative, it was likely the reason why he had escaped the situation alive. He would have hardly been able to defend himself against a stronger werewolf while under the influence of drugs.

The werewolf's scent had been repulsive to Sherlock; he could remember that part clearly. It had made his fangs lengthen inside his mouth, which had not made sense initially (at least, it would not have had he been thinking properly about what was going on), because his fangs only lengthened when he wanted to feed and he most definitely had not wanted to feed from anything that smelt like that. In hindsight, Sherlock knew that his scent had had a similar impact on the werewolf, judging by how tense the man had looked as he passed him. The werewolf (in human form, at that point in time) had brushed past Sherlock almost violently, and Sherlock had snapped at him without thinking about the consequences, raising his voice and telling him in no polite terms to watch where he was going. What had followed was a punch in the face, and when Sherlock then bared his fangs, the man started to shift.

Given how young the werewolf had been, shifting was not a quick process, and it certainly did not seem like a painless one. Sherlock had watched for a few minutes as the creature writhed on the ground, a part of him fascinated, wanting to understand what he was seeing, and then Mycroft had shown up. The rest was a bit of a blur, but Sherlock knew that Mycroft had somehow gotten him away from the werewolf before he had finished shifting. Sherlock refused to consider it a rescue.

The second and third werewolves that Sherlock had had a particularly memorable encounter with had happened several years later, long after the months that Sherlock had spent locked in Mycroft's basement. He had been walking through a street one night – quiet but not completely empty – when he caught onto their scent, and he knew that if he could smell them, they could smell him. Rather than attempting to outrun them, he'd turned and headed into the nearest alleyway, so that they were out of sight of the few humans wandering the street at that time. It had been a good decision to do so, because one of them had shifted as soon as they rounded the corner, taking only a moment to do so, and he had lunged, knocking Sherlock to the ground.

If he ever told the story, Sherlock would always say that it had been an easy fight, and that he had been the stronger of the two of them without question. In reality, they had almost been evenly matched, and Sherlock had struggled with the beast for several minutes as it snapped in his face, trying to bite. When it had become apparent that pushing him off and escaping that way was not an option, Sherlock had tried another method. With some difficulty, he had managed to pin the wolf down, just long enough to sink his fangs into the beast's neck.

In a high enough dose, vampire venom could be immediately deadly to a werewolf. It would slow their heart to a stop in a matter of minutes. However, Sherlock discovered that night that a small enough dose worked rather effectively as a sedative. He had moved away when the wolf's body had gone slack beneath his, but the creature's heart had still been beating, albeit slowly. The other werewolf had lunged at that point, going for Sherlock's throat, and Sherlock had fled to avoid needing another mouthful of fur. Sherlock got away unharmed; it was likely that the werewolf had stayed with its pack mate rather than putting up a chase.

What Sherlock had learnt from these experiences was that making a werewolf lose control was not hard. The latter two had lost control simply because of the presence of a vampire, and the first had only needed some rude words to push him over the edge. When it came to John, however, it had already become abundantly clear that he was not like other werewolves, and that he wasn't going to lose control just because Sherlock smelt of vampire. He was also not losing control as a result of the way Sherlock had tried to push him, pressing topics about what he was. Making John lose control was clearly not an easy task, and so his plan to do so was not one that he could immediately put into action. He had to gather more information about the werewolf first, to learn what topics were sensitive and what was most likely to put him on edge.

Gathering information about the werewolf wasn't really that difficult, either, because John didn't treat him like an enemy. Sherlock might have gone as far as to say that John treated him as a friend (even though they couldn't possibly be friends, because Sherlock didn't have friends, and vampires and werewolves did not get along). So, it wasn't difficult to slip questions into conversation under the pretence of simply wanting to get to know the werewolf better, and the werewolf tended to respond without much hesitation. It didn't mean that John was opening up to him completely, of course – Sherlock could tell when he was skating around certain topics, leaving out information or changing the topic too quickly – but he was still able to learn a thing or two.

He borrowed John's phone one afternoon while John was preparing dinner for himself (that is, he took John's phone off the table when the werewolf put it down and managed to get as far as opening John's inbox before the werewolf noticed and snatched it away from him). He deduced from the engraving and the scuff marks that John had an alcoholic younger brother who had recently split up from his wife (his decision), and that the two of them didn't get along but the brother still wanted to keep in touch. John had praised him for the deductions, called him amazing and fantastic, and then grinned and pointed out that "Harry" was actually short for "Harriet", his younger sister. He had had a bit of a laugh as Sherlock had reprimanded himself for the foolish mistake, but Sherlock filed the information away – addiction and family relationships would likely be a touchy subject.

About a week later, he went through John's drawers while the man was in the bathroom. He hadn't been looking for anything in particular; in fact, he hadn't even been looking for anything to aid his deductions. He had simply wanted something to do while he waited for John to finish up. Beneath the laptop in the top desk drawer, he found John's gun. He was certain he would have deduced that the man had an illegal firearm from everything else that he knew about the werewolf, but this was hard evidence. He would have filed it away in the same way that he had the deductions about John's sister, but John had proceeded to exit the bathroom while the drawer was still open, and he hadn't seemed at all panicked about the gun being discovered. He had told Sherlock, very firmly, to put the gun back, and then he had proceeded to go about his day as normal. Sherlock chose not to read too far into the trust that that must have suggested.

OoO

"Do you know the werewolf that bit you?" Sherlock asked one evening as John bustled around his flat. It wasn't a topic that the vampire expected to be sensitive – given John had been bitten in Afghanistan, it seemed more likely that he wouldn't have been acquainted with the creature who was responsible for turning him – but it was still a gap in Sherlock's knowledge that he wanted to fill. He had information about the person John was now, and information about the person he was before he had joined the army, but the majority of the details about his time in Afghanistan were still unknown, particularly those pertaining to bullet wounds and bites.

John's shake of his head, then, came as no surprise. However, John's next question did. He spoke before Sherlock had had the chance to continue his line of questioning in order to understand how the bite had occurred. "Do you?"

"Excuse me?"

"Do you know the vampire who turned you?"

"Why?"

"Aren't I allowed to learn things about you too?" John took a sip from his mug, before leaning back against the kitchen counter. When Sherlock failed to respond, he prompted, "So, do you?"

Sherlock shrugged his shoulders dismissively. "Of course. Turning for a vampire is not as simple as a bite. You have to be drained of human blood and you have to feed from a vampire at the same time to replenish it. That's not exactly something that can be easily done anonymously."

"Sounds painful."

"Not once the venom's in your system. You're too relaxed to bother trying to resist. Apparently it can be intimate, although my experience certainly wasn't." He wrinkled his nose slightly at the thought.

"Why's that? Who was it who turned you?"

"My brother." Sherlock couldn't help but spit the words, just a little, and John must have picked up on what the tone meant, because he pushed off the counter and moved across the room to where Sherlock was sitting at the desk, leaning against it instead.

"Did you want this?" he asked quietly, making a vague gesture to all of Sherlock, and Sherlock hesitated for a long moment before he decided on responding with the truth.

"No."

OoO

**December, 1887**

It was better than cocaine, better than heroin. He felt like he was floating, soaring high above the clouds. He had never felt so relaxed, so peaceful. Logically, it should have hurt. He'd seen Mycroft's fangs before they had pierced the skin of his neck – they were sharp and they were large, and he should have been able to feel it. At the very least, it should have hurt as much as Redbeard's teeth had hurt when the puppy had been teething, chewing on toys and furniture and occasionally Sherlock's fingers. However, the initial pain as Mycroft's fangs had broken the skin had barely lasted a second, and then it was gone, replaced with waves of pleasure and calmness. Why had he been resisting? He couldn't understand why he had been so desperate to get away.

His limbs felt heavy, and he shut his eyes. He could fall asleep like this. There had been so many thoughts flying around inside his head, thoughts that would have undoubtedly kept him awake for hours as he filed them away in his Mind Palace, but now they were all quiet and still. He couldn't remember the last time his head had been so calm. Had it ever been so calm? It couldn't possibly have been.

His heart rate was slowing, breathing becoming shallower. He must have been falling asleep.

"Drink," he heard Mycroft say. He hadn't felt the fangs pull away from his neck. Something pressed against his mouth, something firm and warm and wet, and the smell was repulsive. He wanted to turn his head away so that he didn't have to breathe it in, and he let out a weak sound. He didn't have the energy to push it away, couldn't stop it from forcing his lips apart so that the thick liquid could pour into his mouth. Even in his relaxed state, the taste made him want to gag. He tried to spit it out, but his head was tipped backwards, and he couldn't stop the liquid from flowing down his throat.

Then the taste was changing, becoming something less revolting. It was still spilling into his mouth, but it wasn't fast enough – he needed more, needed it like air. He pressed into the taste, his strength coming back to him as he reached out a hand to hold the object in place. His teeth lengthened in his mouth, the ends sharpening into points that broke through the skin of Mycroft's wrist, letting more blood run down his throat.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this is the only time I have to apologise for leaving you all for so long. Let it be known that university classes get to a point where they eat up every waking minute of your life. Hopefully this chapter makes up for the wait, though! Thank you all for sticking with me.

Just like the month beforehand, John became less conversational and more irritable the closer it got to the night of the full moon. Sherlock had predicted as much, and it didn't deter him from following the werewolf home or pushing conversation even when he only received single syllable responses. In fact, it had quite the opposite effect - John's irritability only spurred him on, in hopes that being on edge would make John more likely to snap and shift before the moon was full. However, just like any other day of the month, John was impossibly controlled. He would tell Sherlock to drop certain subjects, telling him that he wasn't in the mood to have a conversation or to invite the vampire in for tea, he would refuse to answer questions, and sometimes, if Sherlock pushed particularly hard, he would raise his voice. However, he never needed to stop and breathe to calm himself down before he lost control, and he never showed the slightest indication that he was likely to shift.

The full moon came and went, and John spent it once again locked in the basement of Mycroft's home. Sherlock considered going straight to John's flat when the werewolf arrived back the following day, but he eventually decided against it. John would be exhausted from the preceding night, likely too much so to even care if Sherlock said anything to annoy him. Besides, Sherlock still had questions about the full moon and John's experience of it, and the last thing he needed was for John to decide that the vampire had annoyed him enough to warrant a refusal to answer.

It wasn't difficult for Sherlock to find a way to pass the next couple of days, despite the lack of interesting cases. He had, however reluctantly, promised to track a hunter, and so he passed some time sticking pins into a map on the wall as he traced out the hunter's path. The hunter in question wasn't moving fast, which suggested that he was taking his time everywhere he went, thoroughly searching each city or town for signs of the supernatural. That would be inconvenient, as a thorough hunter would mean that Sherlock would have to deal with him the moment he arrived in London, before the hunter got to him first, or to Mycroft or John. There was no way yet for Sherlock to tell whether the hunter was hunting vampires or werewolves, or something else entirely, but he decided it was best to assume that the hunter was prepared for anything.

He returned to his usual activities a couple of days after the full moon, deciding to visit John one evening after the werewolf finished work for the day. Much to his disappointment, John was unable to tell Sherlock much more about his personal experience of the full moon than he had been able to explain last time – he was still blacking out, unable to remember what had occurred that night. He was also still refusing to believe that shifting voluntarily would be even a little bit beneficial, and he was refusing to accept the fact that his limp was psychosomatic. The only thing Sherlock did manage to learn from their interaction that evening was that, although he had healed by that evening, John had woken up scratched and bruised the morning after the full moon. What that suggested was that the Wolf hadn't learnt from the previous month that the basement was inescapable; it seemed that werewolves were not particularly fast learners. Sherlock could have guessed that much, however. They were known to be creatures of instinct, not creatures of intelligence, after all.

(John had glared at the vampire when he said this bit out loud, but otherwise, he showed no indication of any emotional or instinctual response to the statement, much to Sherlock's disappointment.)

After that, normality and routine resumed once again (if you can ever consider anything in the lives of a vampire and a werewolf 'normal'). Sherlock returned to following John to and from the Tube station when he went out to the shops or to work, and he spent time in the werewolf's flat on the evenings when he did not have a case, experiment, or hunter to be focussing on. He continued to ask questions to gather information, pressing sensitive topics even when John closed off and tried to get him to stop. However, John was controlled, remarkably so, and it was becoming clear to Sherlock that words couldn't affect him in the way he had thought they could. Perhaps, he decided, a different technique was necessary.

After all, he did need to prove that John's limp was psychosomatic. Perhaps he could kill two birds with one stone.

OoO

The morning before the full moon, Sherlock received a text from Detective Inspector Lestrade asking (or begging, as Sherlock preferred to think of it) for his help on a case. Sherlock was going to refuse – he had planned to refuse, because he had other things to focus on, and surely the case could wait until the following morning – until Lestrade had explained that it was a locked room murder. In fact, it was a locked room murder that looked suspiciously like the other locked room murder that had been investigated, and supposedly solved, several weeks prior. Unusually controlled werewolves were incredibly interesting, especially within twenty-four hours of the full moon, but not quite as interesting as serial locked room murders, and if Sherlock had made a mistake on the last case, he had to fix that immediately.

It took Sherlock the entire day to solve the case. Had the case come to him on any other day, it probably would have taken longer – although, of course, Sherlock would deny that. On this particular day, however, he had the motivation to work even harder than usual in order to get it done as early as possible. It helped that it was an interesting case too, of course; he still had the desire to solve it simply so that he could say that he solved it, so that he could know that he was right. As it turned out, he had not made a mistake in identifying the man responsible for the previous murder; he had simply failed to consider the possibility of him having an accomplice willing to carry on his work afterwards. Sherlock's reputation remained intact.

By the time he had solved the case and managed to drag himself away from Lestrade and the detective inspector's determination to finish all paperwork before he went home for the night, the moon was already high in the sky, and the time on Sherlock's phone told him that John would have either begun to shift, or was just about to. It was a disappointment, really, because he would have loved to watch the change happen, but perhaps that was something he could save for another night. For now, he had a werewolf to study. He took a cab back to Baker Street, and had the driver wait outside while he dashed upstairs to find a pair of keys before he returned to the car.

On top of his home in London, Mycroft had holiday houses all over the world, and Sherlock had a set of keys to each and every one of them. He had never been sure whether Mycroft had given them to him in hopes that it would produce some sort of brotherly bond, or if it was simply because Mycroft knew that, if he didn't give Sherlock a set of keys, Sherlock would break into his house just to prove that he could. Regardless, it meant that Sherlock could get into his brother's house without difficulty, whenever he pleased. He didn't doubt that Mycroft was aware of the occasions on which Sherlock stopped by (with the exception of one day when Mycroft was attending to business, and Sherlock had entered his house to move everything four inches to the right). Loath as he was to admit it, Sherlock knew that Mycroft was the one person in the world whose intelligence surpassed his own. Regardless, Mycroft had never made any effort to stop him from entering, no matter what his reasoning behind it was.

He unlocked Mycroft's front door quietly, despite knowing that there was no way he could be silent enough to avoid Mycroft's attention. Vampires didn't need to sleep, and so Mycroft would be awake, likely working or reading, and he would hear the quiet squeak of the door, the sound of footsteps on the shiny floor of the hallway. The only way he could possibly miss the quiet noises would be if he was feeding, and Sherlock very quickly cut off that trail of thought before any images could come to mind.

He worked out the code to unlock the door to the basement based off the oil deposits and dust on the keypad, and what he knew about his brother. He shut the door behind him before he made his way down the narrow staircase, managing to see where he was going without needing to turn on the dim light that hung from the roof. He could hear John before he had even reached the steel door. He could hear footsteps, pacing back and forth, coming closer to the door and then further away. He could hear the sound of heavy breathing, loud panting. Just as he came to a stop at the front of the door, however, everything went silent.

He pressed his ear up against the steel door, and two seconds later, he heard a low growl.

It was a warning, and yet Sherlock didn't feel the faintest desire to back off.

Stomach twisting with anticipation, he reached up to the key that hung off a chain on the wall, and inserted it into the keyhole, watching the door slide open.

In this form, John was bigger than a normal wolf would be, although he would still be able to pass as one to the untrained eye. Granted, that was largely because most people would assume that he was an animal they were familiar with rather than a supposedly fictional creature, but the fact was that there was still similarity in appearance between a normal wolf and a werewolf. His fur was a mixture of grey and shades of sandy brown, almost similar to the colour of his human hair in places, although the colouring was not unusual on a wolf. The only feature that was unusual, the one that allowed people to differentiate werewolves from ordinary wolves, was his eyes - human eyes, the interesting combination of blues, browns and greens that Sherlock had become used to seeing.

Giving the circumstance, however, the most striking feature was the werewolf's sharp, white teeth, lips pulled back in a snarl. His fur was standing up on the back of his neck, and his eyes were narrow, glaring at Sherlock. Other than that, however, he wasn't moving. He wasn't preparing to lunge, to attack.

"Oh, for God's sake," said Sherlock. "Please don't tell me you're abnormally controll-"

The werewolf snarled, and all but flew at him, so sudden that it caught Sherlock by surprise and knocked him to the ground. There was a part of him that was filled with some sort of relief, that John Watson was not about to control himself in his most instinctual form; however, that part of him was drowned out by the part that was more focussed on not getting bitten by a very large, very angry werewolf.

He thrust his arms out above him, pressing them against the werewolf's chest to put some distance between himself and the wolf's snapping jaws. He tried to push John off of him completely, but the werewolf was heavy, and that, combined with the force that he was putting into his attempt to get to Sherlock's neck made sure that the vampire remained firmly pinned to the floor. He squirmed beneath him, managing to get his legs up underneath the werewolf's body so that he could use the strength from his legs as well as his arms. He pushed, and he managed to dislodge the wolf long enough for Sherlock to scamper to his feet, long enough for him to put more distance between them. This meant running further into the basement, until he was back against the wall.

The werewolf got to his feet, shook his head, and then charged at Sherlock once again. There was just enough time for Sherlock to notice (with a sense of smug satisfaction) that the beast wasn't limping, before he had to dive out of the way.

It felt like that fight in the alleyway, all those years ago, except that he and John felt more evenly matched than he had been with the unknown werewolf from before. Knowing his venom could be used to subdue the werewolf, Sherlock let his fangs extend, but John was never still enough for Sherlock to get close enough to his neck. At the same time, the werewolf continued to snarl and snap at whatever part of Sherlock was in reach. Sherlock did his best to put distance between them, to duck and dodge in whatever way he could, but there were times where he'd end up cornered, end up needing to struggle against the wolf in an attempt to get out of a vulnerable position. He had not fed recently enough to have the added strength of fresh blood in his system, and he could have kicked himself for being so careless.

John managed to get his mouth around Sherlock's wrist, and the vampire hissed in pain, kicking at the wolf to get him to loosen his jaw as Sherlock pulled his hand free. He had just enough time to look down and see with relief that John hadn't managed to break the skin. Then the werewolf was on him again, covering Sherlock's body and going for his throat. The vampire tried to struggle, to kick and push and thrash in the ways that had helped him get free earlier, but the position was different this time, John's weight in a different position, keeping him on the ground. He could feel the werewolf breathing, hot on his face and neck, and he pushed at the animal's chest and throat in an attempt to keep his distance.

The feeling of panic travelling through Sherlock's body had to be instinctual. When pinned beneath an animal that could kill you with one bite, it was only to be expected that you feel fear, a sense of impending doom. Sherlock was never normal in that respect. He searched out killers and criminals that would have other people running and hiding, and he never feared dying at their hands. Now, however, he was second-guessing himself, regretting bringing himself into this situation. If he had a working heart, it would be racing. He was afraid.

He could hear John's teeth snap next to his ear, and he tried, again, to push, to get the werewolf away from his neck.

Then suddenly, everything stopped.

The werewolf tensed above him, muscles stiffening, and it gave Sherlock the chance he needed to push him off and get to his feet. He took one look at John, lying crumpled on the floor, and then he looked up, eyes settling on the reason for the sudden change in the situation. He didn't recognise the woman standing before him personally, but he knew from her uniform and the Taser in her hand that she was a member of Mycroft's personal security. He would deny feeling any sort of relief at the sight of her.

The woman reattached the device to her belt and turned to him. "Mr Holmes would like to see you upstairs," she said, and immediately turned to lead him out of the basement.

Sherlock glanced towards the werewolf on the floor, conscious but weak, incapacitated. It was tempting to take the opportunity to properly study him in this form, while he was incapable of fighting. However, the weakness would not last for long, and John would be on his feet in as little as a matter of minutes.

This time, at least, he decided that following the security guard out was a good idea.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been my absolute favourite chapter to write thus far. I just thought you all should know.

"What in the world did you think you were doing?"

Sherlock sighed, slouching further down on his brother's sofa and crossing his arms. He had expected the lecture, of course – what else would Mycroft have had in mind when he sent one of his personal security guards down to the basement? – but that did not make it any more welcome or any less unpleasant. He kept his gaze moving, wandering around the room and never once meeting Mycroft's eyes.

"I'm well aware that you are reckless, but this, Sherlock, is a whole new level," Mycroft continued, disregarding Sherlock's lack of response. "What were you thinking, breaking into a basement built with the purpose of keeping creatures like Doctor Watson –"

"You mean 'creatures like me'," Sherlock muttered, but Mycroft ignored him, continuing to talk without faltering.

"– away from anyone or anything that he could harm, and provoking him? Honestly, Sherlock, it almost sounds as though you've some sort of death wish."

Sherlock allowed himself a brief moment of eye contact with his brother, only to give him a dirty look. "I assure you, Mycroft, I had it perfectly under control."

"According to my security officer, that was most definitely not the case. "

"I would have had it under control if you had given me another minute. It's not as though John is the first werewolf I've met, and I have survived fights with animals far older than him."

"Yes, but Doctor Watson is the first werewolf with whom you've decided to become friends –"

"We're not friends."

"– and we both know how easily sentiment can cloud one's judgement, so it may prevent you from responding in the same way that you would to a werewolf that you did not care for."

"I don't care for him."

"Don't you?"

Sherlock turned his gaze once again to Mycroft to shoot him another glare. "I was going to bite him," he said after a beat. "I was merely biding my time, testing his limits. I most definitely did not need your security woman to intervene."

"I find that difficult to believe."

"I can't say I care."

Mycroft let out an exasperated sigh – a sound that Sherlock was rather used to hearing whenever the two of them conversed. "If you're planning on repeating tonight's events next month, I am going to refuse Doctor Watson access to the basement."

"What good would that do keeping me away from him?" Sherlock said, raising his eyebrows. "I can visit John just as easily, if not easier, wherever else he might stay for the night."

"You and I both know that you wouldn't have come to me if there was another option."

A long moment of silence followed, both Sherlock and Mycroft staring at each other, as if willing the other to give in. They had been like this since they had been children, stubborn to the end, and while Sherlock was not normally one to give up easily or admit failure, he knew his brother well enough to know that there was no other way that this would end. "Fine," he said at last. "Are we done?" He stood without waiting for a response, turning and pushing open the door, all but storming out.

OoO

For John, waking up the morning after a full moon feeling stiff and sore was nothing unusual, nor was waking up feeling groggy and unwell. It wasn't even unusual to wake up to the smell of vampire. However, what was unusual was that the smell seemed even stronger than it had been the past couple of months, or even the night before. It was attached to the walls and the floor, and even to him.

What was even more unusual was the fact that the night before was not a blank space in his memory.

It wasn't clear, especially not at first. It felt like trying to remember a dream – it was there, so close that John could see it, but as he reached for it in his mind it slipped away again. However, when Mycroft's assistant came down to find him, as she always did, she brought another woman with her – a woman dressed in uniform, with a Taser on her belt.

Even after seeing her, he could not remember the entire night, but what he could remember came back all at once. He remembered the sound of footsteps, the smell of rotting flesh. He could not remember the door opening, but it must have, because he could remember the vampire, on him, under him. He could remember growling and snapping and he could remember the sight of sharp, white fangs. He could not remember how it had all ended, other than remembering pain, but the sight of the security guard in the doorway filled in that piece of information there.

Sherlock had been there, last night, in the basement with him. Sherlock had been close enough to bite, and John had very nearly killed him. The thought made his blood run cold.

OoO

Sherlock plucked at the strings of his violin, but his mind was anywhere but on the music (if you could even call it that). Now that he was back in his flat (after taking a long, hot shower to wash away any remaining traces of John's scent) it was time to reorganise his Mind Palace, adding and filing away all the newly gathered information about the werewolf.

John's space in his Mind Palace seemed to be growing rapidly. What was once a file, only scarcely thicker than the files he had on every other person he had ever met, had become an entire drawer, and now it seemed to be turning into an entire room. He could see John in there, in both human form and in wolf form. The wolf there had a permanent snarl on his face, as it was the only way that he had seen him before; the human John, on the other hand, could go through a range of expressions and movements. He could see the wolf lunging and running, though, moving around the room. The human John limped, but the werewolf did not.

Clearly, his earlier deduction had been correct: John's limp was psychosomatic. This was merely icing on the cake, however, as he had been certain that the limp was psychosomatic for a while now. Regardless, it gave him proof that he could present to the werewolf, which may just be enough to chase that silly limp away for good.

By now, John would be home, or very close to it. He would limp his way up the stairs – the limp would be more prominent for the rest of the day, until he had gotten a good night's sleep – and he would make himself a cup of tea. He would leave the cup in the sink to soak when he finished, and perhaps he would try to distract himself, or perhaps he would just try to sleep. It would take John a good couple of days to be back to normal, to recover from the night. Perhaps if John was willing to shift of his own accord, the full moon would not be nearly as strenuous on him.

Sherlock rewound the events in his mind, playing it back again. He played back the way John had taken a minute to snarl at him before he had lunged. John was clearly nowhere near as controlled as a werewolf as he was as a human, but Sherlock wondered if that moment before the attack was a sign of control, of John's conscious mind battling with instinctual desire. He circled the werewolf, looking for any evidence of an internal battle.

Downstairs, there was a knock at the door. Sherlock disregarded it immediately; clients always rang the doorbell, and Mrs Hudson would end up answering it anyway. He continued to pace around the mental representation of the werewolf, stopping in front of him. If John was less controlled as a werewolf, and more controlled as a human, what would need to be done to get him to shift when the moon was not full? Would John's conscious, controlled mind keep himself in check, or could Sherlock appeal to his more basic instincts, make him more likely to –

"What the  _Hell_  did you think you were doing?"

Sherlock opened his eyes, the note he had played on the violin ringing out in the room. John was standing in his doorway, which was an unusual sight. John never came to Baker Street; it was always Sherlock going to John's bedsit. The vampire took a moment to take in the werewolf's appearance. The clothing he was wearing was not torn, but the creases on it suggested it had been folded, so it was likely the clothing that he had taken with him to change into this morning. The messy hair and the few odd scratches and bruises on his body also suggested he had not gone home in between waking up and coming here. He was not holding his cane, and he did not seem to be favouring one leg, even as he took a few steps further into the room.

"Why the Hell would you think it was a good idea to come see me during the full moon?" he continued. "I could have killed you!"

Sherlock leaned over calmly, putting his violin away in its case and standing up. "You couldn't have killed me," he said. "I wouldn't have given you the chance."

"You can't know that! I can't control myself in that form; I can't stop myself from biting you."

Sherlock took a few steps over to the side of the room to put the violin case away, and John followed, taking a couple of steps closer. "I wouldn't have let you bite me. I could have had my fangs in your neck long before your teeth came anywhere near my skin."

John did not seem to find the comment in any way reassuring. On the contrary, he seemed to just become more agitated. He took a step closer to Sherlock. "That shouldn't have even been an option! You shouldn't have been down there in the first place."

"Yes, my brother has already given me that lecture, so don't bother."

"What were you even doing down there?"

"Proving a point. Well, a couple of points, actually."

"And what were they?"

Sherlock took a step closer, and John held his ground, apparently refusing to be intimidated by the vampire. This was particularly impressive, given that the height difference between them. Sherlock was looking down at him, and John had to tilt his head up to meet his gaze. "For one, that you're not completely controlled. I had to know that you are, in essence, just as instinctual as any other werewolf. You're not entirely an anomaly in that respect. And, second," – Sherlock's gaze flickered down and back up again – "your limp is psychosomatic." John opened his mouth to respond immediately, and then he seemed to hesitate, a frown coming over his face. Sherlock took it as a chance to continue. "You don't limp in your wolf form, and you're also not favouring one leg now or using a cane."

The stunned look on the werewolf's face made Sherlock smile smugly, waiting for John to marvel and gape and tell him that he was amazing and fantastic and brilliant.

Instead, John exploded.

"That doesn't mean you can just come see me during full moons!" he shouted, and the surprise at the response overruled the usual sense of satisfaction at getting the werewolf to raise his voice. "Proving that my limp is psychosomatic is not going to stop the Wolf from ripping your throat out."

"I told you, John, you wouldn't have had the chance to hurt me, and do stop referring to 'the Wolf' as though it's separate."

"It is."

"No, it isn't. It was not 'the Wolf' in the basement last night, it was you. It was you who attacked me, and if I had been bitten – that is, if there had been an attempt at biting me – it would have not been from this separate, distinct 'Wolf', it would have been you. You are not human, John. You're a werewolf, and holding desperately onto any contrary beliefs is only foolish and-"

John pulled his arm back, and threw a punch at Sherlock's face.

The action was unexpected, and John's fist collided with Sherlock's cheek, making the vampire snap his head to the side. It hurt, which was unusual, given that Sherlock rarely came across creatures that were strong enough to cause him any pain. More so, however, it came as a surprise, temporarily rendering the vampire speechless. John was now glaring at him, chest heaving despite the fact that the single punch could not have required that much energy.

He was not about to shift, but, as far as Sherlock was concerned, that still counted as a loss of control. A smirk grew over the vampire's face.

"Is that the best you could do, really?" he asked, lifting his hand to his cheek and pressing his fingertips to where a bruise would have formed if he were human. The pain was already fading – any evidence of the injury would be gone in a matter of seconds. "If that's all your strength, I really would not have had any problems getting my fangs to your neck if I needed to. There's really nothing for me to worry about if I come around next month." He saw John's hands clench into fists again at his sides.

"There's a difference between punching someone to get them to shut up and fighting to kill. I could kill you. I've killed people before."

"Yes, in a war, with a gun. This is entirely different."

"Exactly. I didn't have the strength then that I do now. Now I could kill you without any weapons at all."

"Go on, then." Sherlock took a step back, widening his stance and stretching out his arms. "Prove it."

He could see the tension in John's arms and shoulders, and he could see the way his hands were still clenched, almost as though he was holding himself back.

"I don't need to prove anything to you," John muttered through gritted teeth.

"What are you afraid of? That you'll actually hurt me? You're barely a pup in comparison to me; whatever little advantage you have over me in your strength is easily accounted for by my experience and my intelligence. I could have you on your back before you could bark. Or is it that you're afraid of losing whatever's left of your dignity, losing a fight-"

It was all it took for John to snap. He lunged at the vampire, aiming for his middle, but, unlike the punch, this had been more predictable and it was not difficult for Sherlock to get himself out of the way. The werewolf ended up on the floor, but John was quick, and John was clever, at least in regards to hand-to-hand combat. It was easy for him to swing his leg out, to kick Sherlock's legs out from underneath him and pounce before Sherlock had had the chance to get up.

From there, it was a flurry of movement, impossible to follow. It felt similar to the night before, in the sense that they felt evenly matched. Neither of them stayed down for very long, quick to push the other off and get to their feet before they could properly be pinned. Fists collided with jaws, knees collided with shins, and backs collided with the floor. John managed to very nearly break Sherlock's nose at one point, and in the split second that the vampire took to touch it, to make sure that it was still in place for his body to heal, John managed to get him on the floor.

Sherlock could not push him off this time, with the way John was holding him, so he instead hooked a leg around John's hip and used it to flip them over, to reverse their positions. Then they were rolling, both trying to end up on top. The sitting room really was not big enough for them to spar in, and it was impossible to avoid bumping into walls and furniture, even knocking one of the chairs over at one point. John's hands ended up around Sherlock's neck, which was likely a tactic that would be effective on anyone except for a creature who did not require air. Sherlock thrashed and kicked, grabbing onto John's wrists as he reversed their positions again to push his hands away, and then he managed to get his mouth to John's neck.

Immediately, everything stopped. John froze instinctively at the first brush of Sherlock's lips – of his  _fangs_ , which had extended at some point during their fight – against his skin. Sherlock had John's hands pinned to the floor by his wrist, and he was keeping John's legs down using his knees. He could hear the werewolf's heart racing, and he smirked, dragging his mouth over to where he knew the major artery was.

"Told you," he murmured, without breaking the contact between his mouth and John's neck. "If this was real, I'd have my fangs in your neck by now. My venom would be in your system, flowing through your veins, and you would be becoming weaker and weaker, unable to fight, unable to move. You would lose consciousness, and if I didn't stop then, the rest of your body would shut down, and you would be dead." He pulled back slowly, meeting John's eyes, which were wide and dark. "As I said, there is no way you could have harmed me. "

He released John slowly, first freeing the werewolf's legs and sitting back on his own knees, and then releasing his arms. He could still hear John's heart racing, and the werewolf held his gaze for a moment, staring at him, before getting to his feet hurriedly and rushing out of the room, down the stairs, and out the door.

 


	12. Chapter 12

John was avoiding him.

Granted, Sherlock had expected this to be the case, at least for a few days. There was no way that John would easily decide to contact him first. The werewolf would want to keep his distance, undoubtedly still harbouring the feelings of anger that had caused him to lash out in the first place. It was for this reason that Sherlock made no effort to contact John in the first three days after the full moon. John was hard enough to contact after a full moon anyway, because of the time he spent recovering. To try to contact the werewolf while he was still angry on top of the exhaustion would be a waste of valuable time that Sherlock could be spending doing other things, like experimenting or solving cases or tracking a hunter that was moving closer and closer to London.

After three days, however, Sherlock decided it was time to break the silence. If he saw John now, it was entirely possible that the werewolf would refuse to have a conversation, but seeing John would still be a step up from the complete lack of contact. It was impossible to tell when it was that it began to feel so abnormal to not see John, but it seemed that that was now the case, and Sherlock chose not to think too hard on that matter.

The morning of the fourth day after the full moon, Sherlock waited at the entryway to the Tube station. When John failed to come by in the morning, Sherlock made sure to be there at the usual time in the afternoon, but John either did not leave his flat that day or he simply chose a mode of transport other than the Tube. The latter case seemed more likely, because John would not want to take more time off work than was absolutely necessary. More than likely, the werewolf had decided to take a cab to work instead. The following day, then, Sherlock decided he would go by John's flat instead, so that he could catch him before he left for work.

Unfortunately, John was either prepared to go out of his way to avoid Sherlock, or he had become an early riser. When Sherlock arrived at John's flat, he found that the werewolf had already left. Sherlock had only missed him by a matter of minutes, judging by the strength of John's scent on the doorstep, so it was entirely possible that John had just happened to be up earlier than usual. However, the next morning confirmed Sherlock's theory that John was intentionally avoiding him – when Sherlock turned up again, a good ten minutes earlier, he found that John had prepared for that and had left earlier still. John was becoming used to Sherlock's tendencies, and he was going out of his way to keep his distance.

The next logical step, obviously, was to try to meet John on an afternoon instead. The werewolf could leave at impossibly early hours of the morning if he so chose, but he would have to come home sooner or later. John would have to see Sherlock, if Sherlock waited outside his flat long enough. So, come five o'clock, the vampire made sure to be outside John's front door, passing his time searching the internet on his phone while he waited for John to come home.

Two and a half hours later, Sherlock had read upon several topics, including patterns of blood splatters, werewolf mythology, and obscure uses for paper clips, and there was still no sign of John.

There were several possible explanations as to why John was not home yet. He could have picked up an extended shift at work, or simply could be running overtime. He could have had errands to run, or he could have run into a particularly talkative friend, or been held up in some other way. However, it was also possible that something had happened to John, and there could have very well been reason to worry. Sherlock and Mycroft were not the only vampires in London, and if Sherlock had managed to get to John's neck with ease only a few days earlier, it was entirely possible that another vampire could do the same, only in a much more serious setting. That, and there was the hunter that Sherlock predicted to arrive in London within a fortnight. The vampire had not expected him to come this early, but there was the (very unlikely) chance that he had been wrong.

Sherlock pushed the thoughts out of his mind, pushing off John's door. Listing the worst possible case scenarios in his head would not do any good. What would do some good would be finding John and ensuring that he was safe.

OoO

The fact that John had caught a cab to work, while convenient for the werewolf, was incredibly inconvenient for Sherlock. If John had walked to work, his scent would have left a trail that would have been easy enough to follow, but instead, there would be virtually no scent lingering in between where John entered the cab (that was, in front of John's flat) and where John had gotten out. However, Sherlock had solved cases of abduction and kidnapping of humans, whose scents were significantly less identifiable than John's, so this inconvenience would not be enough to cause Sherlock to fail in his mission. He just needed to use a slightly different strategy.

He started by catching a cab himself, telling the driver to drop him off outside the nearest clinic. Sherlock had never bothered to find out what clinic John worked at – it was a mostly irrelevant piece of information that would fill up space that could be used for more interesting facts – so it came as a relief to discover that the nearest clinic was, in fact, the clinic that John worked at. The lights were off inside the building, and Sherlock could not hear any sounds of movement inside. John had been there today – of that, Sherlock was certain – but he had left at least a couple of hours ago.

This time, there was a scent trail for Sherlock to follow, at least for a short while. Inhaling through his nose, Sherlock followed the smell past the building, coming to a stop in the car park out the back. This was where the scent trail ended again. Obviously, John had not gotten into his own car there – if the man could drive, there was no way he would be taking cabs or the Tube. There were no signs of struggle, nothing to suggest that John had not entered a vehicle here unwillingly, but this did not settle the twisted sensation in Sherlock's stomach. Even if John had been offered a ride home by one of his co-workers, why was he not yet home?

The answer was obvious. John had not been offered a ride back to his own home. John had gone back to someone else's home.

This thought was punctuated by the vibration of Sherlock's phone in his pocket. He fished it out and turned it on, making a face at the name that appeared on the screen.

          I gather you have worked out  
          where our dear doctor is this  
          evening.  
          M

Sherlock swivelled around on the spot, locating the security camera that looked down onto the car park, and he made sure to shoot it a glare. His phone vibrated a second time only a matter of seconds afterwards.

          He went home this afternoon  
          with Sarah Sawyer, his  
          manager. He has not yet left  
          her house.  
          M

          You accuse me of caring for  
          him, and yet you're the one  
          spying. What does that say  
          about you?  
          SH

          I only looked into the footage  
          when you decided to venture out  
          in search of your werewolf. I'd  
          much rather you use your time  
          more productively.  
          M

          By which you mean you would  
          much rather I spend my time  
          investigating your hunter.  
          SH

          I need not remind you that this  
          hunter affects both of us, when  
          he arrives. Go home, Sherlock.  
          We both know you're wasting  
          your time here.  
          M

          Don't tell me what to do.  
          SH

          Really, Sherlock, you could at  
          least attempt to be mature  
          from time to time. I have just  
          saved you from investigating  
          a non-existent case of  
          abduction.  
          M

Sherlock turned back to the security camera only to make an obscene gesture, and he made a show of shoving his phone back into his pocket rather than replying to the text. He chose to wander through the streets for the rest of the night rather than going home, just to spite his brother. Mycroft, thankfully, left him alone, except for one text sometime after ten o'clock.

          The lights have gone out.  
          M

OoO

The following day brought with it a case that held Sherlock's attention for most of the day, keeping him busy. At least, that seemed to be what had happened. In truth, he had chosen to take the case only because he wanted something to keep him busy, and although he had solved it within the first two hours, he made sure to drag the investigation on for longer. It was a simple enough case, after all – it was not a case of a serial killer who was going to act again if they did not solve the case quickly. Of course, Lestrade still made sure to lecture him on withholding information when he discovered that Sherlock had known the answer all along.

Rather than heading straight back to Baker Street, Sherlock had the cab driver drop him off near the Tube station. He had no way of knowing whether or not John would have taken the Tube or a cab that day, or if he would have gone back to Sarah Sawyer's home again, but it appeared that the vampire was in luck. The station held the familiar smell of werewolf, strong enough to suggest that it was only a matter of minutes since John had been there.

Weaving through the crowd of people, Sherlock followed John's scent for only a matter of minutes before he managed to catch sight of the man. He could see the werewolf walking a little way ahead, still limping and still leaning too heavily on his cane. He did not look like he had spent the night in a comfortable bed – instead, the stiffness of his back suggested a sofa or a lilo. That was interesting – it implied that John had not gone home with Ms Sawyer for any purpose other than having somewhere to spend the night that was not his own bedsit.

Rather than closing the distance between them, Sherlock remained a small distance behind, following silently. It reminded him of the first time he had spoken to John, several months ago – he remembered following the werewolf home, amused by the way John kept glancing warily over his shoulder, undoubtedly aware that he was being followed but yet dismissing it all too easily as nothing but a figment of his imagination.

This time, however, John did not make the same mistake. Once again, he seemed to notice that he was being followed, but this time, he did not look around with that same lost, concerned expression on his face. This time, he came to a stop on an otherwise empty street, and he did not turn around or give Sherlock the opportunity to duck out of his line of sight.

"I know you're following me."

Sherlock let his lips pull upwards at the corners, and he took a few more steps to close the distance between the two of them. "What gave me away this time," he said, "my smell or the prickling sensation on the back of your neck?"

"Both," John replied without looking at him, "and the fact that I figured you'd start stalking me sooner or later."

Sherlock let out a low chuckle. "And yet you've been avoiding me."

"Yep." John started walking again, forcing Sherlock to do the same to keep up. "Which I'm going to keep doing."

"You're clearly wasting your time. You can't keep avoiding me."

"Watch me."

"Really, John, you're being completely irrational, doing all of this because of a little bit of guilt-"

"Guilt?" John repeated incredulously, looking over and making eye contact for only a fraction of a second before he turned away again. "Believe me, I do not feel guilty. You deserved it."

"Then it's embarrassment because you lost a fight, which still makes this completely irrational."

"Or maybe, just maybe, I've decided I really do not need you in my life anymore."

"Why? " Sherlock raised his eyebrows and took another quick step so that he was almost in front of John. "Because I was right? Because I beat you? Because I-"

"Because you don't care, Sherlock." They had reached the front of John's flat now, and the werewolf turned around, finally meeting his gaze. "Because you completely disregard anyone else's thoughts or feelings and only think of yourself. You knew I wouldn't want you to be there during the full moon, and there was no reason for you to be there, but the only thing you thought about was what you wanted. You knew how to piss me off afterwards and you didn't even think about how I was feeling."

"Oh, come on," Sherlock said. "You enjoy it. You enjoy having me around, having someone to talk to openly. A part of you even enjoyed fighting with me. You aren't going to just decide to-"

"No, I am. I'm done. With – with whatever the hell this is," – John made a vague gesture to the space in between them – "I'm done. Go find some other bloody game to play, because I'm not your experiment anymore."

"John-"

"Don't, okay? Just piss off and leave me alone."

John turned and disappeared into the building without giving Sherlock the chance to respond, punctuating the sentence with a firm slam of the door, and Sherlock had no choice but to do as John said.


	13. Chapter 13

In Sherlock's defence, losing contact with John was not because of a lack of effort.

Sherlock had always been determined, and he was never one to give up easily. Sure, John had told him that the werewolf no longer wanted Sherlock in his life, but that did not mean that Sherlock was going to leave just like that. John had been angry, when he had said that, and it was only a few days after the full moon. Surely, once John had had some time to calm down, he would see the error of his ways and he would be all but begging for Sherlock to come back and forgive him.

So, Sherlock gave him a day to calm down, and then he was right back into his usual habits of turning up in places where he knew John would be. His attempts at changing John's mind, however, were completely unsuccessful. John continued to go out of his way to avoid Sherlock, following unpredictable patterns regarding the times at which he left or his mode of transportation. On the occasions when Sherlock did succeed in meeting with John, the werewolf would say nothing, and no matter what Sherlock said or did, he did not get a response. He found himself longing to hear John even say something like 'Piss off', but yet the werewolf walked through the streets and to his house swiftly, as if Sherlock were invisible, and John never once even looked at him.

At the same time, the threat of the hunter continued to move closer and closer, and the closer it came, the more Sherlock became distracted by it. The hunter was becoming increasingly important, more important than a werewolf that was refusing to respond to him. So, Sherlock began to spend more and more time in his flat, and less and less time following the werewolf about, trying to get John to speak.

And eventually, it became easier to simply stop trying altogether.

OoO

When you considered John's life as a whole, the portion of it during which he and Sherlock had had some sort of strange, unusual acquaintanceship was small. Sherlock had only been a part of John's life for a matter of months, in the matter of months since he had returned to Afghanistan. Those few months of knowing Sherlock were nothing compared to, for instance, the amount of time he spent in Afghanistan, or the number of years he spent studying to become a doctor. In fact, John had even had "relationships" throughout primary school (that did not count as real relationships) that had lasted longer than the few months that he and Sherlock had been, dare he say it, friends. And yet, at some point in those few months, seeing Sherlock several times a week on his way to or from work became normal, enough so to make it feel very, very weird when it stopped.

It wasn't that he cared, of course. It was about time that Sherlock stopped stalking him. It had taken the vampire a while to take the hint and realise that John was not going to talk to him anymore, but at least he had stopped now. Now, John could go to and from work without worrying about the vampire stalking him; he did not have to go out of his way to get up early or stay back late in order to avoid Sherlock. Now that Sherlock was gone, John could go back to living his life normally.

Sure, maybe it would take a while for John to get used to. Sherlock had become something of a constant in his life – he had started to expect to see the vampire more often than not, and it had become surprising when Sherlock did not turn up for a chat. It had become normal for John to imagine what he was going to do on an afternoon and to picture Sherlock being there in one way or another, and so, of course, it was going to seem unusual at first, getting used to going home to an empty flat. However, if John had very quickly become used to having Sherlock in his life, he was going to very quickly become used to it not being the case, and once he had, everything would be a lot easier.

It wasn't like he cared that Sherlock had stopped trying to talk to him. This was exactly what he had wanted.

It most definitely wasn't like he missed him. Not at all.

OoO

There was a sleek, black car parked on the side of the road outside 221B Baker Street.

Correction: there was a sleek, black car parked on the side of the road outside 221B Baker Street, and Sherlock was steadfastly ignoring it.

It had been approximately two weeks and four days since John had told Sherlock to get out of his life (a conversation that Sherlock had not deleted from his memory, but had locked up in a cabinet in his Mind Palace where it could be kept out of the way until a time when Sherlock could afford to be distracted). What this meant was that it had been exactly five days since the day on which Sherlock had estimated the hunter would arrive in London – an estimation that was proven to be incorrect when the hunter failed to arrive.

What was even worse than being wrong, however, was the fact that Sherlock had lost track of the hunter completely.

On the wall above the sofa, pins were stuck on top of numerous cities in which Sherlock had discovered the hunter had been. He had collected evidence through security footage supplied by Mycroft, and he had kept track of everything and anything that was in any way associated with hunters, vampires, werewolves, or any other creatures that a hunter could be hunting. Mycroft had given him a list of names and contact details for the vampires that he knew of in other England cities, and Sherlock had made sure to keep track of them, to contact a couple of the more reliable ones in order to warn them that there was a hunter and ensure that they could be an extra set of eyes and ears for him. One or two members of his homeless network (the few that were aware of the existence of the supernatural) served the same purpose.

On the occasions when the hunter had, evidently, been able to evade attention from both Mycroft and the other vampires, Sherlock had lost track of him for maybe a couple of days at most before something had popped up, and it was easy enough to fill in the gaps. The pins on the map had definitely suggested that the hunter was moving, however gradually, towards London, and a week ago it seemed obvious that London would be his next destination. Why wouldn't it be? A populated city like London, where you could remain virtually anonymous, was ideal for a vampire, and surely a hunter would know that.

And yet, Sherlock had found no evidence that the hunter was or had been anywhere near London in the past few days, and now, he could not find any evidence of where the hunter had been in that time. Police reports, security footage, and even recent blog posts pertaining to the supernatural were spread out over the living room floor like a paper rug, and Sherlock had been going through them for hours, searching for anything that he might have missed. So far, however, the only thing he had achieved was working out which of the blog posts could hold some truth, and which were romanticised ideas of vampires that sparkle and turn the loves of their lives in order to spend an eternity with them.

Across the room, Sherlock's phone vibrated with an incoming call for the fifth time in the past half hour. And, like the four times before that, he ignored it, as he did the sound of his text alert only a couple of minutes later. He did not need his brother to ask him for updates on the hunter's location while he did not have anything to offer, and he most definitely did not need his brother to give him a lecture on failing to do the job that had been set for him. He tore up another irrelevant blog post and added it to the pile, before turning his attention to the security footage. He had been through these images several times already, but he had to have missed something somewhere. The hunter could not have just disappeared off the face of the planet within a few days. He had to be somewhere.

Downstairs, he heard a phone ring, and a minute later, Mrs Hudson popped her head through the doorway. "Yoo-hoo," she said, holding out her phone. "Sherlock, dear..."

"No," Sherlock interrupted, and Mrs Hudson gave him a scolding look, before continuing.

"Your brother is calling."

"No."

"It sounds like it is rather important..."

"Tell him to piss off."

Mrs Hudson made an affronted sound. "Language, Sherlock," she scolded, but she lifted her phone back to her ear nonetheless. "I'm sorry; he's quite busy at the moment."

There was a brief moment of silence when Mycroft spoke, and then Mrs Hudson pulled the phone away from her ear again, covering the mouthpiece before she said, "Sherlock, love, he insists you talk to him. Really, now, you can't just ignore your own family. You know, if I had…"

Sherlock cut her off with a loud groan, hoping that it was loud enough for Mycroft to catch, but he did extend his hand for Mrs Hudson to give him the phone. "What?" he spat into it once he had pressed it to his ear.

The first sound to come through the speaker was a rather exasperated sigh, followed by Mycroft's voice. "Really, Sherlock, is it that difficult to act your age?"

Sherlock glanced over to the doorway, seeing that Mrs Hudson had gone back downstairs, before he said, "I have plenty of time to act this age, thanks to you. I don't see the point in doing so right at this moment. What do you want?"

"I would like you to get into the car."

"And I would like you to hang up the phone and go back to whatever you were doing before."

Sherlock could imagine his brother rubbing his eyes, and he could vividly see the unimpressed expression on his face. "Sherlock," Mycroft sighed. "This is important."

"I'm busy."

"Yes, you're busy searching for the hunter that you have managed to lose track of. Get into the car, Sherlock."

"I do not need a lecture from you. I will find the hunter. I am the world's only consulting detective."

"Or, you could come here, and I could show you something that might give you the location of the hunter."

That made Sherlock pause. He put down the picture in his hand, sitting up straight. "What information do you have that I don't?"

"Plenty," Mycroft replied. "I have information that you won't be able to get a hold of, because I've made sure to keep it from the police records. Now, if you wouldn't mind, get into the car before we waste any more time."

OoO

The full moon was getting closer and closer with every day that passed. John was constantly counting days, now – ever since he had returned from Afghanistan, he was aware of the date of the next full moon, constantly keeping in his mind the number of days he had left until he had to shift again. Having access to Mycroft's basement had provided some comfort, but it was not enough to quell the constant feeling of dread, and so John had even been counting days during those few months.

Now, however, having lost contact with Sherlock and consequently having lost the right to use Sherlock's brother's basement, the thought of the upcoming full moon was even more terrifying. It was almost, almost enough to make him go back to Sherlock and take back everything he had said, but John refused to stoop that low. He did not need Sherlock, and he did not need to fake a friendship with someone who was rude and selfish for selfish reasons such as using the basement.

John had spent the past several days scoping out forests and woodlands around London, looking for one that was quiet enough for him to use without putting anyone's lives at risks. Perhaps the idea of a werewolf in a forest was cliché, like something out of a bad novel, but John, quite unfortunately, did not have another choice. As far as he was aware, there was nowhere else he could go.

It was impossible to find any forests around London that had not become tourist destinations – no matter where he went, he found visitor centres, hiking trails, and anything that encouraged people to visit the forest (and, of course, anything that encouraged these visitors to pay money). He had managed to find one, however, that seemed large enough and quiet enough for him to use without running into anyone, as long as the forest emptied when the visitor centres closed for the night. There was still the risk of someone being out there at night, or even of him losing control and finding his way back to the city, but it was a risk that he was going to have to take, because there was nothing else he could do.

He couldn't help but think about what Sherlock had said, about him shifting voluntarily in order to learn how to control himself. It was a stupid idea, really – shifting voluntarily just meant that there would be more days per month during which he was out of his own mind and in the body of a deadly beast. He had never tried to shift voluntarily before, and there was nothing to suggest that he would not be just as out of control as he was when his shifting was controlled by the cycles of the moon. However, the idea of being able to control himself, of learning to not black out during full moons was like a dream, and it would be so much easier to not have to find empty forests or to lock himself up once a month every month.

He couldn't help but wonder if maybe, just maybe, the arrogant, selfish, rude, impossible vampire had a point.


	14. Chapter 14

Sherlock's eyes skimmed over the report that was lying on top of Mycroft's desk. The report detailed a house fire, with nothing unusual to add. Obviously, this could not be the reason that Mycroft had called him here. He turned the page over, looking for anything unusual in the report, but nothing caught his eye. The report stated that the cause of the fire was a candle left unattended, and there was nothing remarkable in that.

"What am I looking at?" he asked, leaning over Mycroft's shoulder.

"A house fire," Mycroft said, and Sherlock gave him a look.

"Well,  _obviously_  it's a house fire. I can read, Mycroft, I'm not two. Stop playing games and tell me exactly what happened."

"The owner of the house was a woman by the name of Julia Stoner." Mycroft pulled out an image of a young woman. Sherlock studied it for a moment, but the woman did not look the least bit familiar. "According to the report, she was not home when the fire occurred, and appears to be missing."

"But she's not missing."

"No. She was in the house when the fire occurred."

Sherlock let out a loud sigh. "Come on, Mycroft, out with it. What, exactly, aren't you telling me?"

"Julia Stoner was two hundred and fifty seven years old."

"She was a vampire," Sherlock stated, and Mycroft nodded his head.

"Indeed." Mycroft pulled another image out of the report – this one was of a skeleton, looking older than it should for a woman who had, supposedly, only died in a fire this morning. That was the interesting thing about vampire bodies – vampire could potentially live for an eternity without ever looking a day older than they did when they were turned, but if they were killed, their bodies decomposed far quicker than a human's would, depending on how old the vampire was. Sherlock had even heard that an old enough vampire could essentially turn to dust before your eyes, but he had not witnessed this himself.

Vampires could move quickly and had fast reaction times - Julia Stoner would have needed to be incapacitated in some way for her to decompose in a fire. More than likely, it was not the fire that killed her, but instead, a wooden stake, or perhaps even well-aimed wooden bullets. There would be no remains of these in the fire, and no way to be certain, but Sherlock could have a pretty good idea. After all, wooden stakes or bullets tended to be the weapon of choice for a vampire hunter.

"Do we have any way of being certain that this is the hunter?" Sherlock asked.

"Are we ever certain of anything?" Mycroft replied. "In this case, we can be reasonably certain. Security cameras caught a man that fits our hunter's description in the area earlier that day – it seems highly unlikely that a man fitting the description and the murder of a vampire are unrelated."

Sherlock nodded. Whoever – or whatever – killed Julia Stoner had to know enough about vampires and be clever enough to outsmart one. It would be unlikely to be a werewolf, because a werewolf would kill with a bite, not with wood and fire. Another vampire was a possibility, but the balance of probability definitely leaned towards the hunter. "Where was her house?"

"Cardiff."

Sherlock froze, and then stared at his brother, frowning. "Cardiff?" he repeated, brow furrowed. "That doesn't make any sense. You're certain that this is the same hunter that I've been tracking?"

"Would I have called you here if I weren't certain?" Mycroft replied. He pulled the image from the security footage out of the file and Sherlock inspected it closely. The man was turned away from the camera, so not enough of his face was visible for facial recognition software to confirm that it was their man, but the similarities were striking. Besides, the alternative was to believe that there was another hunter on the loose in Cardiff, and that overcomplicated the solution. Often, the simplest explanation was the correct one.

Unfortunately, the simplest explanation was not always the most understandable one.

"It doesn't make sense," he repeated, frowning at the image. "He's broken his pattern. Why would he suddenly change directions?"

Mycroft was giving him a look that told him that the answer was right in front of his nose, and it did not take Sherlock more than a second and a half to figure it out.

"He knows we're onto him."

OoO

The first thing John received when he climbed into a cab late one afternoon was a confused and slightly concerned expression from the driver.

"A forest?" the man repeated incredulously, as if John did not know that that was where he had asked to be taken. "What do you want to go there for?"

John bit back a sigh. "I just do," he said, hoping that the driver would just accept it and turn around and do his job. Unfortunately, he was not in luck.

"It'll be closed by the time we get there, mate. Ain't nobody there but a bunch o' animals and some trees."

"Yes, I know," John said patiently (at least, as patiently as he could manage).

"You sure you don't want to try somethin' else? You could try the forest tomorrow morning, then you'll have all day..."

"I'm meeting a friend," John said, cutting him off. He formulated a lie in his mind as quickly as he could manage before continuing, "He works there. I promised I'd meet him when he finished up. So, I'm kind of in a rush, because I don't want to keep him waiting."

"Well, why didn't you just say so!" the driver exclaimed, and John let out a slight sigh of relief when he turned around and started up the cab. It was not the quietest of trips he had ever had, the driver finding something to talk about even without John replying to anything he said ("Don't like forests, meself. Kinda creepy at night, you know? Reminds me of a horror movie. Say, you ever seen that one with the lass from... oh, where was it…") but as long as he was taking John where he needed to go, John wasn't about to complain.

OoO

Sherlock sat cross-legged on the coffee table in his lounge room, staring at the map pinned above the sofa as though doing so would solve all his problems. The hunter had to know that he was being tracked, somehow – how could he have worked it out? Had he worked out that the other vampires were prepared for his arrival, somehow? Or perhaps one of the vampires that Sherlock had contacted had told him, either voluntarily or involuntarily, that they had known he was coming. Sherlock could contact these vampires later and find out if that was the case. For now, that was an unimportant piece of information. What he needed to do was work out a new way of dealing with this hunter.

He needed the hunter to come back to London, because he needed to be able to remove the threat before he became a threat to any of the other cities surrounding London. Sure, he could track the hunter to another of the cities and go there, but that meant that he would not have the upper hand. Sherlock was intimately familiar with London – its backstreets and alleyways, its forests and woodlands, its web of roads and paths, and all its secrets. If the hunter came to London, Sherlock would have the benefit of knowing his way around. He did not know Cardiff, or any of its nearby cities, nearly as well as he knew London.

Sherlock steepled his fingers beneath his chin and stared at the map.

The hunter wanted to throw Sherlock off his path, likely so he could take the vampire by surprise when he did arrive in London.

Perhaps the best way to lead him back to London, therefore, was to pretend that Sherlock had successfully been thrown off.

OoO

It was an immense relief when the cab finally pulled up in front of the forest. You would think that after almost half an hour of silence from John, the driver would have taken the hint and stopped talking, but no, the particularly chatty cabbie seemed capable of talking to himself for as long as possible. Somehow, he seemed to fill in the gaps of John's silence with normal responses, words that prompted him to speak more, to carry on as he was. John considered telling him, quite clearly, to 'shut up' a couple of times, but he decided against it. John did not like to be rude, and he knew he would have some peace and quiet soon enough.

Well, no, that was not entirely true. He did not expect to have any peace and quiet at all, when they finally arrived, but he wouldn't be listening to the cab driver's monologue shortly enough.

When the cab did pull up, the sun was sinking low on the horizon. Already, the forest - at least, what John could see of it, standing at the side of the road – looked dark, and almost eerie. Perhaps the chatty cabbie had a point – forests were pretty creepy at night. It looked like the sort of place where anyone, or anything, could jump out from the darkness and end you.

Fortunately for John, being killed by something else was not what he was worried about.

He watched the cab disappear from sight before he turned to the forest, leaning heavily on his cane. His leg was giving him more pain today, and he wondered if this was a mistake. Then he reminded himself that this was most definitely a mistake, and that if he thought too hard on that matter he would end up turning back and not taking this risk. He couldn't tell if that was the better or the worse option.

He walked to the car park first, checking to see that it was empty (which it was). An empty car park did not necessarily mean that the forest was empty as well, but it made it seem at least a little bit more likely. It did not provide as much comfort as he would have liked.

John had spent most of the day studying the maps of the forest that he could find online. Of course, none of them gave him information in regards to whereabouts would be the best place for a werewolf to shift, but they did give him information in regards to the locations of visitor's centres and other facilities. At the very least, it told him where would be best to avoid – the places where he could cause the most damage.

He spent a good couple of hours wandering the forest, trying not to pay too much attention to where he was going – if he was lost, maybe the wolf would be too, and it would be harder for him to find his way back out in that form. He told himself that he was passing time because the later it was, the less chance there was that anyone else would be in the forest. In truth, however, he knew that he was passing time so that he could put off doing this for as long as possible, and eventually, he told himself that he did not have another choice. He had to do this now.

Maybe this would work. The vampire had been right about John's past, and he had been right about John's leg (that was, he had been right in assuming John would not limp as a wolf – just because an injury appeared to be psychosomatic did not mean it hurt any less). Maybe he would be right about this too.

Or maybe this would be one of those occasions when he was wrong, and John would regret it for the rest of his existence.

He undressed as quickly as he could bring himself to, stuffing his clothes under a tree root that was slightly off the ground in the hopes that that would keep the wolf from finding them and tearing them to shreds. They would be dirty, without a doubt, but emerging from a forest dirtied and scratched would be better than emerging from a forest naked. Even standing there with no one else in sight, he felt cold and exposed and vulnerable, and he wanted to curl up and hide himself from the world.

You've made it this far, Watson, he told himself. No point turning back now.

He crouched down on the ground and closed his eyes tightly. He had never done this before, and he did not know for certain how he was supposed to do it at all, but he had to try.

He reached deep into his mind, to the part that he kept locked up and hidden away, and he opened the gates.


	15. Chapter 15

John opened his eyes.

It only took him a matter of seconds to remember why he was lying on a pile of leaves and twigs rather than on the lumpy mattress he had back at his bedsit. The forest was dense, trees packed tightly together, but he could still see sunlight streaming through the gaps, telling him that it was morning – presumably early morning, given where the light seemed to be coming from and the general lack of human voices or footsteps. It was impossible to be certain, however, not without a watch. John could not even tell how much time had passed.

None of this was processed properly in John's mind, however, because the first, and consequently only thing he really noticed, was that he was covered in blood.

In a second, he was wide awake, rubbing frantically at his skin in an attempt to clean himself. His heart was pounding in his chest, and he closed his eyes tightly for a moment, trying to get a grip on himself so that he could properly assess the situation. He was not exactly covered in blood, he realised when he opened his eyes again – it wasn't as though he was drenched in it, but it was still there, over his skin and in his hair. There were scratches on his body, but not enough to have resulted in that much blood.

He couldn't breathe. He couldn't get enough air; it felt as though there was something stuck in his throat, blocking his airway. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly and swallowed thickly a couple of times before he opened them again, looking at the ground where he had been lying.

Among the scattered leaves were tufts of fur, matted with blood. John had never seen himself in his wolf form – he could not tell you what colour his own fur was – but he was fairly certain that the fur here did not belong to him. He pushed himself upright, wincing as his muscles ached, and he looked around again.

A little further away from him, there was a dead animal. Or, at least, there was what was left of a dead animal, torn to shreds.

It wasn't human blood. John would be relieved, if he wasn't too busy feeling like he was about to be sick.

He wanted to curl up into a ball like a child, to sink into the ground and disappear. This was a mistake. He had known that this would be a mistake, something he would later regret, and yet he had gone out and done it anyway, because Sherlock had told him to, because Sherlock had told him that it would be beneficial.

Why had he chosen to believe the vampire, even after he had realised that the vampire did not care about him, or see him as anything other than an experiment that could hold his interest?

He forced himself to get onto his feet. He couldn't just lie there in the middle of a forest like a fool. He needed to work out where in this damned forest he had left his clothes.

OoO

John did not allow himself to think about what had happened until he was safely back in his own bedsit. It had taken him less time than anticipated to find his clothes, and more time to find his way out of the forest. He had cleaned himself off as best he could, but judging by the cab driver's expression, 'as best as he could' wasn't quite good enough. He was grateful that the driver was not chatty cabbie from the night before, because that would have led to some interesting questions. At least having an unfamiliar driver meant that he could convince the man that he had been on a camping trip, and he hoped the driver did not look close enough to see the blood in his hair.

Once he was back at his flat, after showering and changing into something clean, he allowed himself to think back to the night before. He had hoped that it would be different; he had hoped that, unlike the nights of the full moon, he would have some memories of the several hours he had spent in his wolf form. He had no such luck – it was a blank space, just as it always was. He could not even remember shifting, this time. He could remember reaching into his mind, trying to shift, and he remembered spending a long while attempting to do so without success. No matter how hard he pulled at the wolf in his mind, he had not been able to bring it forward and shift. He remembered beginning to think it was impossible, and he remembered deciding that there was no point.

That must have been the moment he started to shift, because that was the last thing he remembered. After that, there was pain, and then there was nothing at all.

He let out a shaky exhale, holding his (third) mug of tea with both hands and letting the warmth flow through his palms. Last night had been a mistake, and Sherlock Holmes had been the worst thing to ever happen to him.

OoO

At a glance, it would appear that Sherlock had simply lost track of the hunter.

The map of England still sat on the wall above the sofa, but the pins in it had not extended to Cardiff. The top of the desk was hidden beneath stacks of paper – reports, documents, photographs – and the waste paper basket was overflowing with scrunched up paper balls. Sherlock had neither sent nor received any messages from any other vampires in England or the surrounding areas, nor had he made or taken any phone calls. He had also made no attempt to contact his brother with any new information or questions. And so, to anyone looking into the flat, or making contact with anyone associated with Sherlock, it would appear that he had not solved the mystery behind the house fire in Cardiff, and it would seem as though he was still waiting for the hunter to get back on the map.

However, on the inside, the case was quite the opposite.

It was impossible for Sherlock to tell how the hunter had worked out that they were onto him. There were a number of possible explanations, some more likely than others, and Sherlock did not have the time to go through each of them until they could either be confirmed or dismissed. So, instead, his safest option was to act as though each possibility was the correct one, and to remove the threats that the possibility therefore posed.

It was highly unlikely that the hunter could be spying on the flat. Sherlock did make an effort to go through and ensure that there were no bugs located anywhere there, but just in case the hunter had a spy or camera in the building across the road that could look through the window, or in case any of Sherlock's clients were instead taking note of the flat when they came to ask for help, he made sure to keep the flat devoid of any evidence of his work. This meant that the map on the wall remained untouched, and he left no papers regarding any occurrences in Cardiff or any place that the hunter had visited after that.

The possibility of the hunter having bugged his phone or his laptop was more probable, although even that was unlikely, because most bugs should have either been detected by his laptop's virus programmes or otherwise would have required direct contact with the phone or laptop to be activated. Just to be safe, however, Sherlock stopped using his own devices when he was doing any research or investigation regarding the hunter's location. He had considered using Mycroft's laptop, which would undoubtedly be even safer than his, given Mycroft's security, but if Sherlock was being spied on in any way, his sudden interest in visiting his brother's home more often would arouse suspicion. A public computer lab or library was also out of the question – Sherlock was not going to do any work where his screen was visible to others, nor where anyone else could use the same device.

His solution, therefore, was Molly Hooper. It was simple enough to convince the pathologist to bring her laptop with her to work so that Sherlock could borrow it, and more frequent visits to the morgue would not look suspicious to anybody watching him. If anything, it would seem like he had taken on other cases, which might add to the impression that he was not so actively following the hunter. There was no reason why anyone would be tracking Molly's internet history, unless they felt very passionately about diary-like blog posts and captioned images of cats.

Sherlock also made sure to use a disposable phone on the rare occasions when he contacted Mycroft for information, and he refrained from giving any of his own discoveries to his brother, just in case one of Mycroft's men was listening too closely.

He made an effort to contact some of the other vampires in England just once. He only contacted the ones that he had already made contact with regarding the matter of the hunter, and rather than offering any updates on the hunter's location, he only asked if they had anything to report. Without explicitly stating it, he made it seem as though he had lost track of the hunter and was following whatever leads he could in an attempt to locate him again. After that, he made no effort to contact any of the other vampires. If one, or more, of them was responsible for the hunter's discovery that he was being tracked, whether intentionally or otherwise, Sherlock wanted to ensure that the hunter could only be told that he was safe and had not been found. It was no longer safe to trust anyone, not until the hunter had been taken care of. Mycroft was the only source of information he could trust, and no one could be trusted with the information that Sherlock had himself.

It was too big a risk to keep any physical information. He could not leave anything saved or bookmarked on Molly's laptop, nor could he print any papers to take with him back to the flat. Mycroft could hold onto security footage, of course, because this is something that the elder Holmes would have done even if they were not tracking a hunter, but he could not send it to Sherlock. This would make things incredibly inconvenient, if it weren't for the fact that Sherlock had a rather impressive memory. The hunter now occupied an entire room in his Mind Palace – only temporarily, hopefully, because Sherlock would like to be able to clean the room out once the hunter was out of the picture.

Every little detail Sherlock found was committed to memory, stored in that room. He had the mental equivalent of the map of Britain on the wall, only with the extra pins marking Cardiff and every place that the hunter had been located since. He took his time examining any report or photograph that was relevant, sticking them to the walls of his Mind Palace or filing them away in folders and cabinets. It meant that the entire hunter business was using a lot more mental energy than he would have liked, and some of the information from earlier cases got deleted in favour of making room for the hunter. If he was not investigating or researching, it became necessary for him to wander through the hunter's room, making sure that everything was in its rightful place so it did not get deleted by mistake.

He refused cases from Lestrade, not needing anything else to capture his attention until everything with the hunter was under control. His experiments were left unfinished on the kitchen table and in the fridge, only to eventually be disposed of by Mrs Hudson when they started to smell. Even feeding was something that became unimportant – he fed only when he felt himself becoming too weak to move, and by the time it got to that point, it would often be a struggle for him to get across the room to the fridge.

His entire existence revolved around the hunter and the hunter alone, and that was how it was going to be, until this hunter was found.


	16. Chapter 16

Nothing. For weeks and weeks there was nothing.

Sherlock followed every possible lead he could find, doing everything he could to track the hunter's movements without drawing attention to the fact that he was doing so. His efforts frequently produced results, if you classified results as  _locating the hunter_. The number of pins on the mental map in Sherlock's Mind Palace grew, marking each place where Sherlock knew the hunter had been. However, the hunter's pattern never became clear to him. It seemed as though the hunter did not have a pattern at all, and for that reason, Sherlock could not succeed in predicting where the hunter would be before he arrived there. The pins on his map were useless if they did not serve the purpose of providing an indication as to where the hunter would be next.

One month passed like this, and then another, time wasted and lost before Sherlock had even had the chance to stop it. Lestrade grew increasingly irritated with Sherlock as he refused case after case, making an effort on more than one occasion to come to Sherlock's flat in person to ask him what on earth was so important that it was preventing him from even skimming over case files. One of those occasions happened to be after Sherlock had gone a little too long without feeding, and anyone who knew what Sherlock was would be relieved that the vampire had enough self-control to not lose himself at the first smell of fresh, warm blood. However, to Lestrade, Sherlock had looked very pale and very weak, rather as though he was at death's door, and Lestrade's visits suddenly became a lot more frequent and for purposes other than presenting cases. The detective inspector also brought some of his men over for a drug's bust, just to be safe, and Sherlock was relieved that he had not had any blood bags in the flat at that point, even though it was not a good thing in terms of his health.

None of this changed Sherlock's dedication to – or, perhaps, obsession with – finding the hunter. No matter how many cases Lestrade brought, Sherlock's mind could not be dragged away from the case that he had. In the back of Sherlock's mind, however, he found himself beginning to wonder if the hunter would even return to London at all. Was the discovery that there was a vampire in London tracking him enough to scare the hunter away from the city in total? Or, perhaps, did the hunter not know that there was a vampire in London at all, and was his unpredictability the result of something else entirely? Was lying in wait for the hunter to return to London not enough?

They could not just let the hunter continue like this, even if he did not come near London or any of the vampires in it. With every report of a missing person or a tragic event, or a death that was not quite like the other deaths that the police force investigated, the issue of the hunter became more and more pressing. The hunter had to be found and the threat removed, not just for the sake of the individual vampires that he could harm, but for the safety of their kind as a whole. It was thanks to Mycroft's position of power that he could remove evidence that pointed to their existence, but there was still only so much he could do. How long was it before a particularly intelligent police officer came along to investigate a crime scene and worked out that something was wrong?

And so, with every day that passed without the results that Sherlock wanted, Sherlock grew increasingly impatient, increasingly frustrated, and increasingly stressed. With every day that passed, the task that had originally seemed so simple began to seem more hopeless, and Sherlock began to experience a feeling he had hardly experienced before in his existence – the feeling of failure. It was hateful.

Then one day, almost out of the blue, Sherlock received a coded message from Mycroft, sent to a disposable phone. It took him less than a minute to decode it, but even before then, he knew what it would say – after all, why else would Mycroft have contacted him in this way?

_He's here_.

The world seemed to make sense again. The feeling of failure was replaced with a feeling of determination. The game was on.

OoO

Sherlock took one cab to St. Bart's Hospital, and got into another ten minutes later to take him to Mycroft's home. It was unlikely that it would make a difference now if anyone knew that Sherlock was visiting his brother, but after the past couple of months of trying to avoid attention, it had become something of a habit.

The walking blood bag opened the door and led him to Mycroft's office without saying a word, but it came as no surprise that Mycroft was expecting him. They had both been waiting for this moment for months, and now that the hunter was here, he needed to be dealt with immediately. There were too many vampires in London – and, of course, one werewolf – whose lives could not be put at risk.

The first thing Mycroft showed him was an image from a security camera that had captured the man. Sherlock recognised him immediately – he had spent far too long staring at the man's picture to ever forget the way he looked – but facial recognition technology had confirmed his identity nonetheless. This had been made possible, of course, by the angle of the hunter's face.

"He looked straight at the camera," Sherlock pointed out, and Mycroft nodded his head.

"Indeed. It would appear that he wants us to know that he is here."

"Why?" Sherlock asked, and then answered his own question before Mycroft had the chance to speak. "He wants to lure us out. Do we know where he is now?"

"One of my men followed him..."

"And the fact that that was at all possible tells us that he wanted to be followed."

"Of course. He ended up at a forest approximately forty minutes from here and has not yet left, but I cannot say exactly where he is within it."

Sherlock's gaze trailed over to the forest map sitting with the rest of the documents in the file, and he pulled it out, skimming over it briefly. The forest would seem like a good place for a hunter – there were lots of hiding places, and it was far enough away from people to avoid attention while he took care of the vampires he was hunting. Additionally, vampires were not known to spend a great deal of time in forests – that was something werewolves were known for, not vampires – and so it would appear to the hunter that he had the upper hand, choosing a playing field that his prey was unfamiliar with.

Unfortunately for the hunter, Sherlock was not like the others of his kind, and he had spent enough time in that particular forest to know his way around. In this particular playing field, he would have the upper hand (but, of course, Sherlock tended to have the upper hand wherever he went).

"Well then," he said, straightening up. "If he wants me to come out and play, who am I to refuse?"

"He'll be expecting you, Sherlock. Do make sure you don't do anything stupid."

"He won't know what to expect. Really now, Mycroft, I've survived far worse than a human with a gun."

"Sherlock," Mycroft began, but the younger Holmes turned away before he had a chance to finish his sentence, heading for the door.

"Good afternoon, Mycroft. I'll contact you when he's been taken care of."

"At least wait one night before you run into the forest like a fool," Mycroft said quickly, before Sherlock had a chance to get away. "I can organise some of my men to assist you as backup." As an afterthought, he added, "And for goodness' sake, make sure you're fed. You look like death warmed up."

OoO

Sherlock, unsurprisingly, decided not to wait one night before he went to the forest. The idea of trying to be unpredictable was a good one, of course, but every night they waited was a night that the hunter remained on the loose, posing threats to any vampire and potentially any other supernatural creature. The faster he was taken care of, the better.

Besides, Sherlock reasoned, for all they knew, the hunter expected Sherlock to try to be unpredictable, and so, turning up on the first night would take him by surprise.

The younger vampire did listen to his brother in part, however, and he made sure to feed before he left. He was not foolish enough to go out without the energy that was given to him by feeding. The last thing he needed was to not be at the top of his game and to get hurt because he had been careless enough to go out without enough blood in his system.

He waited until the sun was setting before he fed. He found a blood bag in the bottom of the fridge, warmed it through and drained the mug quickly, and then he made sure there was no blood on his face before he grabbed his coat and hurried out into the night.

OoO

It was dark by the time he arrived at the forest. It had closed several hours ago, and no one would be left there now – no one except the one person he was interested in finding. Sherlock was certain that the hunter had not yet left, because he passed by a car he recognised as one of his brother's. He made sure to keep himself from sight, so he did not draw the driver's attention. The last thing he needed was for his brother to find out that he was here and jeopardise his mission.

He moved into the forest quietly, inhaling through his nose as he tried to pick up on the hunter's scent. Sherlock had never met the hunter in person before, and so he would not be able to recognise the smell of his blood – which would be very similar to any other human's blood as well. However, as the hunter should be the only person left in the forest, any scent of human blood would lead him to the one human he wanted to find.

Sherlock also was not going to rely on smell alone. He would not be the world's only consulting detective if he found people by acting as a sniffer dog; that would make him no better than your average werewolf. He kept his eyes on the ground in search of footprints, immediately ruling out any print that was too small or in groups of two or more – the hunter worked alone and would walk alone. He made note of any disturbance in the forest, such as any broken tree branches that did not look natural, although it was entirely possible that these disturbances were caused by a hiker and not a hunter.

He moved quickly, but quietly, listening out for the sounds of movement not caused by his own feet. Every now and again he would hear something behind him and start, turning quickly towards the sound of the noise before realising that it was caused by a mouse or a bat, or another equally harmless creature. This was not like a normal case, for him. This was not exciting and stimulating, not in the usual way – this was just making him feel tense and on edge.

He inhaled through his nose, the smell of human blood getting stronger, getting closer, and he followed it, closing in on it, and then he froze. There was another smell in there, of something neither human nor animal, and Sherlock recognised it immediately. It had been a long while since he had been anywhere that smelled this strongly of it, but Sherlock could recognise John's scent anywhere.

The split second that he hesitated, surprised to find that scent here, was the moment a gun fired.

Sherlock moved, but not fast enough. The bullet hit his abdomen, and he stumbled backwards with the force of it. He knew immediately that it was made of wood; any bullet would hurt, but with any other material, his body would force it out so that he could heal. Wood was the exception; wood would become lodged in the body, and the healing process could not, and would not, begin until even the tiniest splinter had been removed.

It felt as though time had slowed down, and the world had gone silent. He could no longer hear the rustle of wind through the leaves or the scurrying of paws along the ground. He was falling, and a voice in his mind told him to fall backwards, to land on his back so that the bullet would serve as a plug and stop him from bleeding out. His back hit the ground, and above him, he could see a figure in the tree, holding a gun. He watched as the figure crouched down, grabbing onto the branch beneath his feet and lowering himself down.

The man's feet hit the ground, and time suddenly sped up again. Lying on his back was all well and good if Sherlock's only purpose was to keep himself from bleeding out until someone could remove the bullet, but if he just lay there, the hunter would have a clear shot to his heart, and then Sherlock would not be doing any more waiting. He heard the sound of a trigger being pulled, and he forced himself to move, managing to push himself out of the way just before the bullet whizzed over his head.

He pushed through the pain, fangs extending in his mouth as he pushed himself upwards. It felt near impossible to do even that; he could feel the blood soaking through his shirt, and he felt himself growing weaker every second. If he bled out, and a human found his body, cold and still, he would end up in a morgue, not with a blood bag pressed to his lips.

The hunter pulled the trigger again, and Sherlock felt hastily along the ground, wrapping his hand around a rock and using what little of his strength he had to fling it at the hunter. It ruined his aim, and the bullet lodged into a tree. Sherlock took advantage of the second that his throw had given him to fly at the hunter and bite.

At least, that was what he tried to do. It seemed, however, that he had overestimated the strength he would need, and he fell short, landing back on the ground. The hunter shot at him again, and Sherlock could not move fast enough to stop it from hitting somewhere below his shoulder, too close to the heart for comfort. He could feel himself bleeding, but there wasn't as much blood as you would expect – he was beginning to dry out, and he couldn't find the strength to move.

He had underestimated the hunter, and he was going to pay the price with his life.

The man aimed at his chest, and Sherlock tried to muster up whatever strength he had left to move.

It happened too fast for Sherlock to realise what was going on. Something flew over him, landing in front of the hunter, and although Sherlock couldn't make out what the figure was by sight, he knew the smell immediately. He could hear the sound of snarling, the sound of gunfire, and he managed to turn his head enough to see a large wolf lunge at the hunter and take him to the ground. The human didn't stand a chance.

He needed to get out of there, Sherlock knew. The werewolf would turn on him the moment he had finished with the hunter, and that would be it. However, he could feel himself slipping into darkness, and he did not have the strength to even move a hand to cover his wounds. Would it be worse to die at the mouth of a werewolf rather than at the hands of a hunter?

The werewolf turned to him, hackles raised and teeth bared, and Sherlock would have tensed as it came towards him if he had enough strength to do even that. It was over. There was nothing he could do but admit defeat. He closed his eyes, and waited for the bite.

But it never came. When he opened his eyes again, a moment later, the wolf was standing over him. The fur on the back of his neck stood up, tension visible all the way through his body, but it did not go for the bite. Instead, slowly, so slowly, he lowered himself to Sherlock's level, pressing his wet nose to Sherlock's neck, and then he pulled back, lowering himself to the ground as if in submission, as if to say that he meant no harm.

"John," Sherlock said – or, at least, he tried to, but all that came out was a breath of air, and then he could not fight it any longer, and he slipped away into the darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This scene has fanart! I'm speechless. Thank you so much to Kelpie/Tumblr user theroyalprussianarmy. See below:
> 
> http://theroyalprussianarmy.tumblr.com/post/152887867744/he-had-underestimated-the-hunter-and-he-was


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to say a massive thank you to everyone for the response I got to the last chapter, with special thanks to everyone who commented. You guys are fantastic.

John had not given up on teaching himself to shift voluntarily after that first attempt.

He had planned to, definitely. His first experience had been more than unpleasant, and he had been in no rush to repeat it. In fact, he would have been quite happy to never repeat it again. However, the fact of the matter was that he would have to repeat it again, every month for as long as he lived. So, when the full moon left him curled on the forest ground, sore all over and with fur stuck between his teeth, he knew he had to do something, and his options, unfortunately, were limited.

His first experience shifting voluntarily was not a pleasant one, but he had not made it out of the forest and had not killed anyone – at least, not any humans – and so, perhaps he could not consider it a complete failure. He didn't know what else he could try – there was no Werewolf Support Group he could attend, no experts who could tell him how to stop blacking out when he shifted. If he wanted to learn control, he had to try to control himself on his own.

The second and third attempts had gone rather like the first, only without the dead animals on the third. He wasn't sure if that was a sign of control, or a sign that there had been no animals near enough for him to reach. The latter did seem unlikely, however, as that was the occasion when he had ended up farthest away from where he had started. It took him a full half hour to locate his clothing – a full half hour of wandering through the forest in the nude and feeling like a bit of an idiot.

He had nothing to show from any of his attempts – he had not managed to control himself or stopped himself from blacking out. He couldn't tell if he was becoming faster at shifting, either, because he could never remember actually shifting, aside from some vague memories of pain. All of his attempts had seemed like a waste of time, as though they were getting him nowhere.

That was, at least, until his fourth attempt.

OoO

It took John about twenty minutes to shift from werewolf form to human form. Of course, John did not know this, because it is very difficult to have a concept of time when you don't have a clock and your mind is on other things. Just like every other time, John could not tell how long it took him to shift, and so he had no way of determining whether or not that was faster or slower than he usually was.

However, this time was not like every other time, because this time, John remembered.

He could not remember most of the night. He could not remember shifting into the wolf's form and he could not remember what he had done to begin with. He could not even remember how he had gotten to the place where he was now. However, he could remember a human. It was not a very nice human; he could remember being shot at, and that had hurt quite a bit even though the wooden bullets had barely penetrated his thick skin.

The memory of killing the human were fuzzy, but John knew that he had done it. He could still taste the blood in his mouth. He had not had the chance to think, had acted solely on instinct, but if the human was shooting at him, it was likely the case that he had not had a choice. At least, that was what he was telling himself, because he did not have the time to panic.

He remembered, vaguely, turning to where the smell of vampire was, and he could remember wanting to fight, to kill, because that was his instinct. That was the moment when the memories became clear. A part of him had wanted to bite, instinct telling him to kill the creature before the creature could kill him, but somehow, something had changed his mind. Somehow, he had managed to think, to rely not on instinct, but on his own mind, the part that knew that this was Sherlock and he did not want Sherlock to die.

And somehow, that conscious part of his mind had managed to keep himself from biting the vampire for long enough for him to shift back into his human form.

There was time to think about that later. Right now, his priority was the vampire lying motionless on the ground beside him.

His hands moved to cover the bullet wound on Sherlock's abdomen, but it wasn't bleeding anymore. He checked for a pulse without thinking, and there was a moment of panic before he remembered that vampires might not have pulses. At least, he hoped that was the case; he had never asked. He patted down Sherlock's trouser pockets, managing to locate his phone and pull it out. He opened up the contacts list, looking for one name in particular. He could not find what he was looking for under 'M' or 'H', but after another minute of scrolling he found a contact labelled 'Fatty' and decided that he was probably making a pretty safe assumption. He clicked call and lifted the phone to his ear.

Mycroft Holmes picked up the phone within two rings. "What is it  _now_ , Sherlock?" he said, sounding exasperated and almost tired. "Surely you don't expect me to have any more..."

"Mycroft," John said quickly. "It's John."

There was a long silence on the other end of the line, and when Mycroft spoke again he sounded significantly more alert. "What's happened?"

"He got shot." John was careful to keep his voice calm, calmer than he felt – the last thing they needed was to waste more time because Mycroft was unable to understand what he was saying. "The wounds aren't bleeding anymore, but they were, and he hasn't got a pulse..."

"Did any of them hit the heart?"

"Um." John pushed Sherlock's coat aside, trying to get a better look at his chest. The blood had soaked through his shirt, staining the material red. He couldn't tell where the bullet wounds were.

"Doctor Watson," Mycroft said barely a second later, tone more urgent, "did any of them hit his heart?"

John pulled open the first few buttons of Sherlock's shirt, pushing the fabric aside. There was a wound beneath Sherlock's left shoulder, too close for comfort, but a near miss was a miss all the same. "No," John said. "No, none of them hit his heart."

There was a rush of static through the phone, and it took John a moment to realise that it was a quiet sigh of relief.

"And the hunter," Mycroft continued after a brief pause. "Is he…?"

"Dead," John finished, pointedly keeping his gaze forward rather than looking over his shoulder to where he knew the hunter's body would be, in pieces.

"If Sherlock's body isn't already healing," Mycroft said, "it means the bullets are wooden, and he won't heal until they've been removed. He'll need to feed to replace the lost blood in his system. Are you still in the forest?"

"Yes."

"One of my men is just outside of it. Activate the Bluetooth on Sherlock's phone and stay where you are; I'll have him come to you."

OoO

For a creature that did not sleep, the sensation of waking up was abnormal, and it felt wrong. The thoughts in Sherlock's mind were jumbled and hazy; he didn't know what was going on and nothing made sense. His body felt heavy, everywhere from his legs to his eyelids.

There was a taste of plastic in his mouth, and the taste of blood – not warm and fresh, but icy cold. It was nowhere near as desirable as the taste of blood should be; it made him feel sick. He let out a muffled sound of protest, spitting the plastic away and turning his head.

"Sherlock," said a familiar voice – he knew that he knew it, but he could not tell who the voice belonged to. Why were his thoughts so fuzzy? "Come on, you need to drink."

The plastic was lifted to his lips once again, and he said something that was supposed to be the word 'No' but came out as more incoherent mumbling, turning his head away again and pursing his lips shut against the cold blood. He felt it drip down his chin, but he could not find it within himself to care.

"Oh for God's sake," said the voice, now sounding exasperated, and the plastic was pulled away from his lips, replaced a second later with the taste of warm, fresh blood, straight from the vein.

Sherlock could recognise the scent immediately – he knew it wasn't human blood, but the blood of a werewolf – and yet the smell was nowhere near as vile as the vampire had initially thought. He wasn't repulsed by it. There was a part of him, a part of his fuzzy mind that wanted to pull away, because it had been so long since Sherlock had fed from a warm body and there was a reason why he had not done so in several years. However, there was a larger part of him that wanted the blood, needed the blood, and his throat had never felt so dry.

"Come on, Sherlock," the voice murmured, and with the smell of blood right there, right beneath his nose, he couldn't find it within himself to resist. He parted his lips and let the blood flow into his mouth and down his throat.

Blood bags were satisfactory – they did what he needed – but they were nothing compared to fresh, warm blood, nothing compared to feeding for a living being. This was what a vampire craved, what a vampire was made to do. It was even better than Sherlock remembered; the blood felt heavenly, flowing down his throat, making his heart beat, pumping it through his veins and making him feel warm. There was a hand in his hair, but he was only vaguely aware of it; every part of his hazy mind focussed on nothing but the wrist pressed against his lips and the taste of blood. He felt his fangs lengthening inside his mouth, his strength coming back to him with every drop of blood flowing through his veins. He let his fangs dig into the skin, wanting to bite, to suck, to take more blood than he currently could –

The hand in his hair tightened, giving it a hard, sharp pull that forced Sherlock's head up, away from the wrist in front of him, and he squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. He could still smell the blood, and he leaned towards it again, only to be met with another sharp tug of his hair.

"Easy now," said the voice, and the hand pulled away from his hair after a brief moment. Sherlock opened his eyes, blinking a few times to focus before finally taking in the situation.

He was lying on a bed. Not his bed, definitely – his bed was larger, and softer, and didn't smell so strongly of werewolf. That scent made it obvious where he was. His chest was bare, and a glance down at himself told him that the wounds on his body had healed – or, at least, were in the process of healing. There was a first aid kit on the floor beside the bed, lying open, and there was a half-empty blood bag next to it. Across from him, John was sitting up on the bed, pressing a cloth to his wrist.

He could taste blood –  _John's_ blood – on his lips, and the realisation of what had happened was only just beginning to hit him.

"Nice of you to join the land of the living," John said, sounding far too calm for the situation. A beat, and then he added, "Well, 'living' being a relative term. How are you feeling?"

Sherlock blinked. Dozens of thoughts were swimming around in his head, in ways that made them impossible to focus on, and before he could stop himself he found himself asking a stupid question. "What happened?"

"You got shot. Do you remember that?"

Sherlock nodded mutely, hand moving to his abdomen. He could remember the hunter, and the wooden bullets. He could remember the pain of being shot, the certainty that he was going to die.

He could remember the werewolf that had come out of nowhere, that had stopped the hunter from shooting again, and that had not killed Sherlock himself.

"You saved my life."

John gave him a funny look. "No, you still look pretty dead to me," he said, and the joke was not the slightest bit funny, yet Sherlock found himself letting out a laugh anyway. He pushed himself upright, leaning back against the wall that the bed was against.

"How did we get back here?"

"I had your brother's help. You should probably call him and let him know you're okay, actually. He wanted you to come straight back to his place, but I figure I was probably better equipped here to remove the bullets. Do you need more blood, by the way? I don't know if you had enough or not; I just didn't want you biting me."

Sherlock frowned at him for a moment. "Our bites aren't deadly to you. We don't have to inject venom when we feed."

"Oh? Well, I didn't know that. And it was probably better I didn't risk it, anyway. That'd be a great way for you to repay me, accidentally poisoning me."

"And yet you risked letting me feed from you anyway. I could have killed you."

"I think you underestimate my strength. Pass over the bandages, will you?"

Sherlock picked up the bandages and passed them over, watching as John removed the cloth from his bleeding arm, wrapping a bandage around it. Sherlock's eyes fixated on cut, his hand unconsciously clenching into a fist. John did not appear to notice. He filled in the silence, continuing to talk.

"Besides, you didn't really give me a choice, hey? You needed blood, and you were refusing the bag."

Sherlock swallowed thickly, and he drew his eyes up to John's face again. "Yes, well, it was cold. Blood doesn't taste very nice cold. Usually I microwave it."

"Oh, you microwave it. Of course, I should have known that," said John, lips half pulled upwards. He tore the piece of bandage he had used from the roll, tying it off.

"You're remarkably calm," Sherlock commented.

"Would you rather me be panicking?"

"I'd expect you to be. I've just fed from you. And you did just kill a man."

"Yes, well, he wasn't a very nice man."

Sherlock was silent for a moment, before he said, "No, he wasn't, was he?"

John met his eyes and cracked a smile, and Sherlock wondered, again, how the werewolf could be so calm, after everything that had just happened. The fact that John had allowed Sherlock to feed from him, in particular, was remarkable – he wondered if it had ever been done before, a vampire feeding from a werewolf. It seemed unlikely, unless the vampire had been feeding with the intention of killing. And yet, there was John, who hadn't seemed to think twice before offering his wrist to Sherlock, trusting in his own strength to ensure nothing went wrong.

_You are unusual, aren't you?_

John slid off the bed, glancing at his hands. "I'm going to go clean up," he said. "You should call your brother. If you need any more blood, there's some left in the bag for you to warm up."


	18. Chapter 18

Sherlock stood in front of the mirror in John's bathroom, examining the scars on his chest and abdomen. It was strange, to see his skin marked like that. His body healed everything, usually within a matter of minutes – he could fall off a building and break every bone in his body, and be up and walking in less time than it took for an ambulance to arrive (perhaps after re-breaking some of the bones to ensure that they healed in the correct position, of course). Add a tiny splinter of wood into the equation, however, and suddenly his body could not handle it. It was ridiculous, really; all a vampire's strength and enhanced immune system, destroyed by a splinter.

It was unlikely that these scars would be permanent, he knew. It was a possibility, of course; if even the tiniest piece of wood was still in his body, somewhere under the skin, the scar could be there forever, a permanent reminder that he had failed. However, he trusted that John was clever enough to know how to remove bullets without leaving pieces behind, and it did seem like his body was healing.

He owed the werewolf his life – at least, as much of a life as a vampire can be said to have. If it wasn't for John, Sherlock would be lying there in the forest, cold and still with a wooden bullet through his heart. Even if, somehow, the hunter had failed to hit Sherlock's heart and left him as he was, it was improbable that he would have been found by anyone with the knowledge and capability required to remove the bullets and give him blood. The werewolf had saved him. Perhaps Sherlock owed him some sort of thanks.

He prodded at the scar on his abdomen. It hurt a little – not a lot, but enough to cause some surprise, given the fact that Sherlock never had marks on his body that hurt to be prodded. He touched it again, and he was fascinated by the way his body instinctively sucked his stomach in to get away from the unpleasant sensation.

"Sherlock?" called John's, followed by a knock on the door. "You okay in there? You haven't passed out or anything, have you?"

Sherlock gave his reflection a quick once-over one more time, before opening up the bathroom door.

"They're not healing as quickly as I'm used to."

John snorted, stepping past Sherlock through the doorway so he could put the first-aid kit back in its place. "You've not even had twelve hours to recover yet. Most gunshot victims take months for it to look like yours do. I'm jealous, I'll be honest. I'd have loved to be back on my feet the day after I got shot."

"Yes, well, I'm not used to having scars. I watch injuries heal before my eyes. I can show you –"

"I'll take your word for it, ta. I've seen enough injuries for one day. Besides, I kind of did get to see you heal over several hours."

"Normally, you see it over several minutes, if that."

"Yeah, I figured." John stepped out of the bathroom, back into the main living area of the bedsit, and Sherlock followed as the werewolf spoke again. "Did you need any more blood, by the way?"

Sherlock glanced over at the blood bag again, still lying where it had been left by the bed. It was perfectly acceptable blood, and would be far more enjoyable to drink once it had been put in the microwave for a minute, but he found he felt absolutely no desire for it. Clearly there was enough blood in his system for him to function, and so he shook his head in response to John's question.

"Right. I'll pop it in the fridge, then, and you can take it home with you, I guess." He leaned over to pick up the bag, and Sherlock watched with a faint frown on his face. It made no sense, how John could be so calm about all of this – there he was, putting a bag of blood in the fridge for storage as if it was nothing more than an ordinary plate of food. John should have been more distressed over this; he should have been screaming, not offering Sherlock blood (from both a bag and from his own body), and in a way, it made Sherlock want to scream and yell, because John was impossible and unusual and Sherlock could not understand how he could exist.

John closed the fridge door, and looked over at Sherlock, a frown coming over his face. "What?"

Sherlock pushed those thoughts out of his mind, instead bringing up a question that was now much more pressing, now that he could focus. "What were you doing in the forest?"

There was a beat before John responded that was only slightly too long. "Nothing."

"Well, obviously you weren't doing nothing," Sherlock said, walking closer to where John was in the kitchen area and leaning back against the wall there.

"No, you're right, I wasn't; I was saving your life."

"You were there before I was."

"No, I followed you to make sure you didn't get killed."

Sherlock smirked a little. "No, you didn't."

"You don't know that. I could have."

"Believe me; I would have noticed if you were following me. Plus, you are, quite frankly, a terrible liar. Come on, what were you doing, in the forest, on a night other than the full moon, in your wolf form?"

John exhaled heavily through his nose. "Oh, you already know."

"Of course I do, I just want to hear you say it."

"Say what? That you were right?" – Sherlock grinned, but it faded quickly as John continued – "Well, you weren't right. Yes, I took your advice and I tried to shift more regularly to get used to it, but it's kind of just been a waste of time."

"You didn't kill me today," Sherlock pointed out. "Something in you made your mind click from instinctual to conscious. I doubt it would have done that if you had not tried shifting before."

"Maybe you're just lucky. Maybe seeing you bleeding to death brought out my doctor's instincts."

"Which overruled your werewolf instincts? Perhaps, but only if you had developed enough control to allow that part of your mind to take over."

"You're very sure of this for someone who has no idea what it's like to be a werewolf."

"It doesn't mean that I'm wrong."

John was silent for a moment as he put the kettle on, pulling out a mug from the cupboard, and then he sighed. "No, I suppose it doesn't."

Sherlock grinned. "So then, I was right."

"You weren't right. You just weren't wrong."

"Not wrong is, by definition, right."

"God, you're ridiculous. Look, I saved your life, I'm pretty sure you don't get any bragging rights. Now, why don't you tell me about the bloke who almost killed you?"

Sherlock walked over to John's desk, perching himself on the edge of it, and, just like before, he started to talk.

OoO

Sherlock told him everything, detailing to him the story of the hunter, beginning when Mycroft first brought over the file to the moment that John had found him in the forest. It was no longer necessary to keep secrets about his work; he explained all the evidence he had gathered and how he had come across it, and he explained how he had changed his mode of investigation when it became apparent that the hunter had caught onto them. John was silent throughout most of it, except to occasionally inform Sherlock that what he had done was amazing or fantastic, and Sherlock couldn't help the warm feeling that blossomed in his chest every time the compliments came out of John's mouth.

Towards the end of Sherlock's story, when he explained going off into the forest alone, John's compliments turned into statements, pointing out that what Sherlock had done was risky and stupid, and that the vampire was incredibly lucky that it had just so happened to be one of the nights that John was out in the forest as well. Sherlock wanted to insist that he had had everything under control and that he had known what he was doing, but even he could not deny that he had made a mistake in underestimating the hunter, and he was lucky that John had been there to save his life. It would not be a mistake that he made again.

It was late afternoon when Sherlock finally left John's bedsit – not because John had become angry and kicked him out, but because of a mutual agreement that it was time to leave. Sherlock took with him the partly-full blood bag, wrapping it in another plastic bag to lower the risk of it leaking and carrying it in his pocket so he did not have to explain himself to the cab driver. He kept thinking back to how John had been so open and friendly despite what had happened the last time they had met, and he wondered if John would expect him to stay away again now or if he would willingly let Sherlock back into his life. It wasn't as though Sherlock had done anything to prove that John was more than an experiment to him, which was the reason why John had been so angry with him before, but perhaps saving another's life produced an emotional attachment. Maybe there were some things that could not be lived through without later becoming friends.

That was something that Sherlock could think about later, however. He could see what the incident had meant in terms of their friendship the next time he went to see John (for, of course, he would, now that the hunter was out of his head and now that there was actually a chance of John responding to his attempts). For now, however, he was content to go back to his flat, with a strange feeling in his chest. This must have been happiness.

The happiness lasted up until the cab pulled up in front of 221B Baker Street, and Sherlock realised that the handle on the door was straight.

"Oh for God's sake," he muttered under his breath, paying the driver and climbing out. He made sure to turn the handle slightly so it did not hang straight as he made his way through the door and up the stairs. Any hope that his brother might have already left disappeared very quickly at the sight of Mycroft sitting in the chair – in  _his_  chair – in the living room.

"Good to see you up and moving," said Mycroft.

"What are you doing here?" Sherlock said, his voice taking on something of a snarl. "I texted you to inform you that I was not dead; isn't that enough for you?"

"Forgive me if I wanted to see with my own eyes that my little brother is healing properly, after he  _foolishly_  ran off into a forest, against my warnings, in order to take down a hunter." Mycroft raised his voice towards the end of the sentence, anger and frustration clear in his tone, and it only put Sherlock more on edge.

"I had everything under control."

"You most certainly did not! You're lucky that Doctor Watson was the one who found you and not some human. You could be lying in a morgue right now, not parading around your flat as if nothing occurred."

"Yes, I _could_ , but I am not. Honestly, Mycroft, there is no use in you dwelling on what could have happened. I am no deader than I usually am, your hunter  _is_  dead, and I don't see why we're having this conversation."

"We're having this conversation because next time, you might not have your werewolf around to save you."

"There isn't going to be a next time! I'm not a child, Mycroft. It's hardly as though I've needed John to save my life before and I doubt I will need him to do so again."

"It only takes one bullet to end your life, Sherlock. You only need to make one foolish mistake, and the way you acted last night makes it clear how often you make foolish mistakes. I'd rather not have to receive a call informing me that I need to identify your body."

"Don't worry. If I were killed by a hunter I'm sure they would be clever enough to ensure my body is never found, or at least cannot be identified."

"Sherlock."

"Really, Mycroft, don't get so worked up. Caring doesn't suit you. It's not an advantage; you were the one who taught me that."

Mycroft was silent for a moment, and Sherlock used that moment to walk over to the fridge, pulling it open. He reached into his pocket, where the unfinished blood bag was, but stopped in surprise as he discovered that the fridge drawer had recently been restocked. It was full to the top with blood bags, and Sherlock could see by the labels on a few of them that there were several different types.

"I took the liberty of acquiring some more blood bags for you before I arrived," Mycroft explained, apparently content to move from their previous conversational topic. "You will, of course, require blood more regularly for the next couple of weeks while you are healing."

Sherlock snorted, pulling the blood bag out of his pocket to put away.

Mycroft continued, "And if you cannot be trusted to adequately take care of yourself, I will organise someone to check in on you regularly and to make sure you're feeding." He paused for a moment, apparently catching sight of the bag in Sherlock's hand, and then he asked, "Why is that bag not empty?"

"I didn't need it," Sherlock said, putting it in with the rest of his stock and glancing over his shoulder. Mycroft was frowning at him.

"You wouldn't look as well as you do at present if that were all you had had to drink, and I only supplied Doctor Watson with a single bag."

The look on Mycroft's face made it clear that he knew – or, at least, that he had his suspicions. Sherlock was not going to give him the pleasure of the argument, and he most definitely was not going to confirm what his brother was thinking. "You've overstayed your welcome, Mycroft," he said. "You've made your point and you've seen that I'm alive, now leave."

"I do hope you know what –"

"Leave, Mycroft. Now, if you wouldn't mind. Don't you have a country to run?"

Mycroft was silent for a moment, before he pushed himself up from the chair, picking up his umbrella. "Perhaps I should let Doctor Watson know how regularly you should be feeding," he said on his way out. "I'm sure he can keep an eye on you."


	19. Chapter 19

John changed the bandages on his wrists before he went to bed that night, making sure to clean the cut with antiseptic to prevent it from becoming infected. Perhaps it was overkill, for a wound that size, but John wanted to be sure. After all, he had never fed a vampire from his own vein before, and he had no way of knowing whether or not the wound was more likely to get infected as a result.

He took a moment while he was cleaning himself up to study his wrist, paying less attention to the cut and more to the two small indents where Sherlock's fangs had pressed into his skin. John had pulled him off before he could break the skin, unaware that being bitten would not necessarily mean being poisoned, but the marks that they had made were still visible. They would not take long to fade, however. John doubted they would still be there when he changed the bandages the next day.

Perhaps it should have concerned him, how quick he had been to offer up his own wrist when it became clear that Sherlock wasn't going to drink from the blood bag. The vampire had hardly been keeping it down, and he had barely been conscious with the amount that John had managed to give him at first. John didn't need to be an expert on vampires to know that Sherlock had needed blood as quickly as possible, and if he was not going to take the bag, John offering his own wrist had seemed like the logical thing to do.

Well, no, that was a lie. Offering his wrist had not seemed like the logical thing to do, because John had not even given himself a chance to think logically about the situation. He would say that he had been acting on instinct, but he doubted werewolves (or humans, for that matter) were supposed to possess an instinct that told them to let a vampire feed from them. Perhaps, he thought, it was the instinct of a good soldier, to save a life even if it meant risking one's own.

The experience of being fed from had not been wholly unpleasant, at least. It had not hurt as much as one might have expected, but John had no doubts in his mind that that would be different if Sherlock had actually bitten him. The cut on his arm had stung, of course, but other than that, it had just felt kind of strange. It wasn't like donating blood, which was a sensation John had been very familiar with before he had been bitten in Afghanistan. It was more unpleasant than that, but for the most part, it had just felt weird. It was certainly draining, in terms of energy, and John had felt weaker after it, but not enough to make him worry about having lost too much blood.

He re-bandaged his wrist and cleaned up after himself, remaking his bed with fresh sheets while the ones that Sherlock had laid on while John had taken care of his wounds were in the wash. Sherlock had not bled all over his sheets like a human would have, given that the vampire had been more or less dry by the time he had gotten back to John's flat, but John was a doctor and he liked to keep things sanitary. He would have preferred to take care of Sherlock on an operating table in a sterilized room, of course, but he could not exactly have taken care of a vampire if anyone were around to see him. He trusted that being a vampire meant that Sherlock would not so easily get infected. He had certainly seemed to be well on the mend by the time he had left.

John went to bed with these thoughts on his mind, but neither the memory of the hunter nor the vampire drinking his blood haunted his nightmares that night.

OoO

When Sarah asked at work the next day what had happened to his arm, John told her that he had accidentally leaned on the hot plate when he was preparing dinner last night. She winced in sympathy, and John took that as a good sign that she believed him. He told the same story to the nurse and the receptionist who asked the same question, but other than that, the day proceeded as any other day would, as if the day before had not involved anything out of the ordinary.

That was, at least, up until John stepped out at the end of the day and found a black car waiting for him.

John didn't notice the car, at first, simply because he was not expecting nor looking for it. Cars parked on the side of the road could be waiting for someone else, and when you have no reason to expect them to be waiting for you, they tend to fade into the background and become part of the scenery that you don't process. However, as John started to make his way towards the Tube station, the car followed, and that was when it caught John's attention.

The car passed him slowly, and then stopped. John frowned at it, and then kept walking. Once he passed it, the car started moving again.

John stopped. The car stopped.

John moved forward. The car moved forward.

John stopped. The car stopped.

John sighed. If the car were a sentient being, it might have given John an expectant look.

Most people would be frightened, to discover that they were being followed – stalked, even – by a car with tinted windows, but John was more frustrated than afraid. Granted, the fact that the vehicle was familiar to him probably played a part in that. He moved over to the car and tapped on the window, his own reflection glaring back at him until the window was rolled down.

The driver was unfamiliar, but on the few occasions when John had been picked up before the full moon, he had not had the same driver twice. The pretty woman in the back seat was more familiar, of course, which confirmed what John had already known. The only question was, therefore, why Mycroft was sending a car to follow him.

"Hey, um, you realise the full moon is a good couple of weeks away?" he said. The driver barely glanced at him, but he continued anyway, "And, you know, I'm not even spending the full moons at your boss' place, anyway, so there's really no reason for you to be here right now."

The driver did not speak, but the woman in the back did after a moment. "Mr Holmes would like to speak with you."

"Oh, would he?" John said, feigning surprise. "Well, that's just grand. Isn't it a shame that we don't have some sort of portable devices that allow us to talk to each other? Gee, that sure would make life easier."

Mycroft's assistant did not look amused.

John sighed. "I guess there's no way that I'm getting out of this, yeah?"

In response, the driver climbed out of the car, walked over, and opened the back door for John. John hesitated for a moment longer, before deciding that the quicker he got into the car, the quicker he could get this over and done with, and maybe he would be home in time to catch the next episode of  _Doctor Who_. So, he slid into the car beside Mycroft's assistant, closing the door behind him, and he resisted the urge to complain as the driver took off again.

OoO

To John's surprise, the driver did not take him to Mycroft's estate. Instead, it took several turns and quiet streets, enough to cause John to completely lose his bearings, and eventually it turned into what appeared to be an abandoned building. John was certain that it had gone the wrong way – or, perhaps, it was just passing through – until the headlights shone upon the unmistakeable figure of Mycroft Holmes, umbrella and all.

John climbed out of the car, somewhat reluctantly, and he walked up to the figure. Mycroft gestured to a small chair sitting in front of him. "Have a seat."

"I'm right, thanks."

Mycroft looked him up and down in a way that was all too familiar – there was something about the Holmes brothers that constantly made you feel as though you were under scrutiny every time they looked at you. "Indeed, your leg does not seem to be bothering you nearly as much. I'd go as far as to say you don't need that cane anymore. I presume you're still using it out of habit more than anything else."

"Sorry, what am I doing here? And what are you doing here, for that matter? I'm pretty sure you have a perfectly good house."

"When one is avoiding the attention of Sherlock Holmes, one learns to be discreet, hence this place."

"All this to avoid letting Sherlock know you've had a talk with me?" John raised his eyebrows. "You know I could just tell him, right?"

"Of course, and that is entirely your decision. However, I thought it best to give you the option to keep our little conversation a secret, if you so choose."

"And why would I want to do that?"

Mycroft swung his umbrella upside down, studying the tip absently. From him, it seemed like the equivalent of shrugging one's shoulders in a dismissive manner. "As I said, I simply thought I would give you the option."

He lowered his umbrella again, and took a step towards John, glancing down at the bandages on his wrist. John resisted the urge to hide his hand behind his back.

"Interesting place, the wrist," Mycroft commented, an expression flickering over his face that almost, almost looked like something of surprise, for the brief second while it was there. "It would not be his usual choice, certainly. Shall I assume that means you were the one who... initiated it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," John said. Mycroft gave him a look.

"Doctor Watson, this conversation will run a lot smoother if you assume that I know everything."

"Well, whether you know it or not, I don't see how it's any of your business."

"I like to know that my brother is taking care of himself, and not taking unnecessary risks along the way. You have become an unexpectedly large part of my brother's life, and I need to ensure that you will be suitable as a feeder."

"Who said anything about being a feeder?"

Mycroft glanced pointedly at John's wrist in response, and John raised his arm in gesture.

"Your brother almost died, and he needed blood. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure this was not a promise to continue as a permanent feeder."

Mycroft hummed thoughtfully. "Perhaps. However, that is far simpler for you than it could be for him."

"What do you mean?"

"It is true that vampires are known to feed with the intention of killing, and that they will prey on any easy target on the street with no consideration for their well-being. However, to feed from someone without the intention of killing them, or to take a permanent feeder, is a much more complicated matter. Blood sharing is not simply like donating blood, Doctor Watson. There is a reason why vampires often develop rather intimate relationships with their feeders, and that is not simply because of the pleasurable effects of venom on a human."

John frowned, silent for a moment as he tried to work out precisely what Mycroft was implying. Mycroft, fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately) continued to speak before John had the opportunity to respond.

"Of course, I don't mean to say that letting him feed from you once will lead to anything similar to a typical vampire-feeder relationship, particularly due to your… biology, and it does not mean that Sherlock will be interested in feeding from you again. Regardless, it is important that you understand that your blood sharing will not leave his mind as quickly as it may leave yours."

"So you're telling me I shouldn't have... fed him," – the words felt awkward and almost wrong, and John hesitated for a second before continuing – "unless I planned on continuing to do it?"

"Not necessarily. I merely felt it was important for you to understand this."

"Right," said John after a moment, unsure of how else he would be expected to respond. He went to ask if they were finished, but Mycroft continued talking before he had the chance.

"It would probably benefit my brother to have a living feeder, particularly one who can insist on him feeding every two to three days, as he should."

"Well, you should probably find someone else for that job, because I'd rather not be your brother's blood bag."

Mycroft hummed. "There would not be very many people who Sherlock would be willing to feed from, you know. My brother does not often get close to others, and there is a reason for that. To my knowledge, you are the first to become his friend since he was turned."

Something about Mycroft's tone of voice piqued John's interest, and the werewolf couldn't help but ask, "Did he have many friends while he was human?"

"Just one," Mycroft replied, and for a second, the older vampire seemed to drop his gaze, an odd expression coming across his face. "I do believe that played a major part in his behaviour following his turning, including his reluctance in befriending others."

John frowned a little. "I would ask you what happened, but I get the feeling that it's not your place to tell me, and it's not my place to hear it from you."

"Indeed." Mycroft studied his umbrella absently for a moment, before looking back at John. "I would not be telling you at all, if it weren't... relevant." The sentence was punctuated with a brief drop of his gaze to John's wrist, and then back up again. "Ask him about Victor Trevor."

John wasn't sure if it was his place to ask about 'Victor Trevor' at all, but he made a mental note of the name nonetheless. "Is that all?" he said.

Mycroft nodded his head. "My driver will take you home. Have a pleasant evening, John."

"Right. You too." John hesitated for a moment, before turning around and heading back towards the car. He heard Mycroft speak once more, right before he climbed in.

"Do be careful, Doctor Watson. For both your sake and his."


	20. Chapter 20

John did not see Sherlock after his conversation with Mycroft, nor did he see him the following morning. However, when he got home from work the following day, after walking back to his bedsit from the Tube station, he found the vampire leaning against his door, waiting for him.

John stared at him for a moment. He had expected to see the vampire again – in fact, he had expected it yesterday, and it had come as something of a surprise when Sherlock had  _not_  turned up – but after months of ignoring him and eventually not seeing him at all, to find the vampire waiting for him once again felt unusual. "Yeah, all right," he sighed, stepping up to the door and inserting his key once Sherlock had stepped out of his way. "Come on in."

He didn't miss the grin that came over Sherlock's face, just for a fraction of a second, and John led the way into his flat. "You know," he said, glancing over his shoulder at the vampire. "This doesn't mean you're not a selfish bastard."

"But yet you're talking to me," said Sherlock, the expression on his face smug. "Clearly that means you've changed your opinion of me."

"No, I still think you're selfish, and I still think you only care about yourself," said John, "but you were also right, about me shifting voluntarily, so I suppose I can't hate you for that. And, also, I saved your life, so you owe me."

Sherlock frowned for a moment, before saying, "Fair enough."

John moved straight over to the kitchen area to put the kettle on, and Sherlock headed for the desk, propping himself up on it next to the laptop. It was strange, how automatic the movement seemed to be – they had gotten so used to this before, to making use of the small amount of space that John's bedsit had to offer and having conversations while John prepared dinner or tea. It would all look so normal, as long as you paid no attention to the actual content of their conversations.

"To be honest," said John, "I kind of expected to see you yesterday. Where were you?"

"I was giving you space," Sherlock replied. "I thought you would be more open to conversation if I did not overwhelm you."

John scoffed. "Yeah, right. I don't know if you know how to be patient, Sherlock, and you definitely wouldn't be for the sake of giving me space."

Sherlock frowned a little. "Well, I might have also needed to talk to Lestrade."

"Who?" John asked. The name sounded familiar, and he went over it in his head, quickly remembering the context in which he had heard it. "Oh, he was the policeman, right?"

"Detective Inspector," Sherlock corrected with a nod. "I had to inform him that I am once again available to consult on cases, and I went to see if he had any for me. Which he did not, because for some reason he thinks he should keep me from helping. He said something about me helping only when it suits me and not when they need me, although I believe being able to help when it suits me is precisely the job description of a consulting detective."

The expression on Sherlock's face was so serious, as if he legitimately could not understand why Detective Inspector Lestrade would want to refuse his help, and John couldn't help but laugh.

The sound made Sherlock frown even more. "What?"

"Did you tell him why you weren't consulting on cases for the past few months?"

"Not the truth, if that's what you're asking. I doubt Lestrade's brain would be able to process the truth. I simply told him that I was busy."

John snorted. "So basically, you gave him no reason."

"It was a perfectly acceptable reason."

"Look, Sherlock. People like reliability. If I didn't turn up to my job for several months because I was busy, I'd get fired. Lestrade doesn't know that he can rely on you at the moment, so of course he's going to be reluctant to let you in on anything."

"I was not in a position to offer my assistance."

" _I_ know that, but Lestrade doesn't. For all he knows, you were not doing anything but being lazy and you were refusing to help simply because you felt like it."

"What do you suggest I do, then? I can't just tell him I was off after a hunter..."

"You don't have to do anything. I'm sure he'll ask for your help sooner or later. I'm just saying, it's not unreasonable for him to refuse your help now."

Sherlock's response to this was simply to stare at John as if he were offended that John had taken Lestrade's side instead of his own, and John used the moment of silence to finish making his tea. He turned around and leaned back against the kitchen counter, jiggling his tea bag around in his cup. "How are your wounds looking?" he asked after a moment, and Sherlock seemed momentarily confused.

"Hm? Oh. They still aren't fully healed. I'm not quite sure what the expected recovery time is for wounds caused by wood. It isn't as though I've been shot before."

"Do they hurt at all?"

"No, not really. They just feel strange to touch."

"No surprises there, given you're not used to having scars. It wouldn't surprise me if you've just been poking around at it because you find it interesting."

The expression on Sherlock's face morphed into one you might see on a child caught with his hand in a tin of biscuits, and John laughed. "You have, haven't you?"

"As you said, I'm not used to having scars. Am I not allowed to study the way my body works?"

John merely smirked in response. He took a sip of his tea, and then said, "If you were any other patient, I'd ask for you to come in for a check-up so I can make sure you're healing properly, but I don't think that's going to be necessary in this case. It's probably not going to get infected, given the way it looked when you left the other day, but just keep an eye on it and let me know if it starts to look funny."

"I'm fairly certain my immune system is capable of fighting off infections."

"Yes, but you've never been shot with wood before. Are you sure that doesn't cause any damage to your immune system?"

Sherlock frowned, and then shook his head. "I doubt it would, now that the wood has been removed, but I have no way of being certain without doing more research."

"Exactly. So just keep an eye on it, okay? And if it does get infected, then I can... try to become an expert in vampire biology so we can take care of it."

Sherlock was silent for a moment, staring, and he spoke before John had the chance to ask what was wrong. "Why do you care?"

"What?"

"Why do you care whether it gets infected or not?" His tone of voice did not sound hurt or otherwise emotional in any way. The phrase was something you might hear from a teenager, needing the constant reassurance that their friends cared for them, but it did not seem that way coming from Sherlock. He sounded as though he was genuinely confused by the fact that John was doing this, and he seemed more interested in understanding why John cared rather than in being reassured that he did.

It was a strange question to answer, as well. People didn't care for a particular reason. That wasn't how sentiment worked. John could not explain to you why he cared about his friends, in the same way that he could not explain to you why they were his friends at all. Emotions never followed any sort of logical trail. "Because I'm a doctor?" he answered after a moment, unable to keep his tone from rising at the end of his sentence to turn it into a question.

"You're also a werewolf. You should have killed me in the forest, but you didn't. You went out of your way to save my life, and you're now continuing to ensure that I'm recovering properly, despite the fact that you've expressed disliking me because I am selfish – which, might I add, I'm not denying. You shouldn't care, and yet you do."

John shrugged his shoulders slightly. "I guess I'm just a little weird."

"You are." Sherlock's tone was serious. "I can't understand you."

John took a sip of his tea so that he didn't have to reply for a moment. "To be fair," he said eventually, "you're kind of unusual yourself."

Sherlock didn't argue with that.

OoO

It was strange, how easy it was to get back to where they had been several months ago. More often than not, when there is some kind of falling out, in a friendship or relationship or even within a family, it takes effort to go back to being normal and comfortable around one another again. John had had more than one relationship throughout high school and university that had ended badly, and he could not imagine ever getting back in touch with those ex-girlfriends. He had had break-ups that had led to many an awkward class, and he had had falling outs with friends that had similar results.

And yet, with Sherlock, it was suddenly like the past several months had not happened. Sure, he still thought Sherlock was selfish, and it was not as though Sherlock never said things even now that did not anger him. However, their fight from before seemed like something from the past; the anger John had felt at Sherlock coming to him in the basement had dissipated. It was easy to get back to how they had been before, easy to get back into the routine of Sherlock joining John on walks to and from the Tube station, or simply joining him on an afternoon for a discussion over tea, presuming the vampire had not been invited to consult on a case. It was easy. That was the only way John could describe it. John never had to put any effort into getting along with Sherlock; it just seemed to flow.

"Easy", of course, did not mean their friendship could ever be described as normal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My original plan for this story only had about twenty chapters. However, I currently have up to the start of chapter thirty sitting on my laptop, and it's not over yet. I just want to say a quick thank you to everyone who has followed this story so far, especially to those who have left kudos and commented on it. I hope the rest of the story does not disappoint!


	21. Chapter 21

"There's little over a week left until the full moon," Sherlock said.

This was in the place of a greeting, one afternoon as John exited the Tube station. Of course, this was not anything out of the ordinary – Sherlock did not tend to greet John in the normal way. The werewolf could not so much as imagine him saying anything along the lines of "Hi, how are you?" John had long since become used to Sherlock seeming to appear out of nowhere, to suddenly be walking beside him, starting a conversation as if they have been talking for hours.

John was also used to the fact that Sherlock always has a point. The statement that the vampire had greeted him with today would not simply be an observation about the time of the month. There was a reason that Sherlock had brought it up. That reason merely would not be immediately apparent.

"Yes, I did know that."

"Are you planning on shifting before then?"

_Ah_ , thought John.  _There's the reason_.

"I don't know, I haven't really thought about it. Why?"

"I think I should come with you."

John stopped dead in his tracks, forcing Sherlock to do the same, and he stared at the vampire once Sherlock had turned around to face him. "You're joking, right?"

"No, I'm being quite serious."

"Did I not make it clear enough that I kind of don't want anyone around when I'm shifting? You realise that was kind of the reason why I was really pissed off at you, right?"

"That was before you saved my life. While you were in your werewolf form, might I add."

"That doesn't mean I won't kill you if you're there again. You were lucky, Sherlock. I don't know, maybe the fact that you were dying appealed to the more conscious part of me. It doesn't mean I won't try to rip your throat out if we're there together again."

"You can't know that until you try."

"Yes, but my way of finding that out would be to wake up to find your decapitated body, which I would rather not do."

"That's presuming you cannot control yourself, and I can't protect myself. I assure you, if it became necessary, I could either avoid you, or inject you with just enough venom to subdue you without causing you any lasting damage."

"Sherlock," John said, starting to walk again, "you realise that that arrogance is the reason you ended up bleeding out in the middle of the forest last week, right?"

Sherlock opened his mouth to argue, and then hesitated for a moment. "Well, regardless," he said after a beat, "I am still more than capable of defending myself against you if the situation called for it. However, I find it far more likely that you will be able to control yourself, given the way you behaved last week."

"I don't know, Sherlock. This is entirely different."

Sherlock took a quick step forward to get ahead of John and then stepped in front of him, turning to face him and cutting him off. "You told me that your attempts to shift voluntarily as I had told you to do were a waste of time, because you had not been seeing any results. That means you were not feeling any more in control of yourself, and you were finding it no easier to remember what had happened while you were in your wolf form, correct?"

John could see where this was going already, and he did not like it. "Correct," he said, unable to keep himself from sighing a little.

"And yet, you managed to not kill me last week. So, you not only were able to control yourself, but I'd also wager that you had some memories when you came around – namely, memories that reminded you that you had to save me."

John's shoulders dropped a little bit more. "Yeah, I did."

"So perhaps, having someone familiar there helped to trigger the more conscious part of your mind. Perhaps my injuries were irrelevant."

John snorted. "You know, that sounds like you're taking the credit for what happened."

"I have a point, however. The difference between the times when you failed to control yourself, and the time when you did, was my presence."

"And, you know, the fact that I had had more experience, and there was a hunter shooting at me, and you were dying."

"John, I might be right. Perhaps I can help you focus."

John sighed, coming up to his front door. He pushed the key in, unlocked it and pushed the door open, and then he hesitated. He let out a sigh, turning around, and he let the door half-close behind him. "Promise me," he said, his tone more serious than Sherlock had heard it be in a while, "promise me that you won't let me hurt you, or anyone else."

"I really don't think that will be necessary."

"No, shut up. Promise me that you won't put yourself in more danger than this will already do. Please."

Sherlock was silent for a moment, watching the werewolf, before he said, "I promise."

John nodded his head once. "I've got the next couple of days off work," he said, pushing the door open again. "We can try tomorrow night."

OoO

It did not surprise Sherlock, when he arrived at John's bedsit the following afternoon, to discover that the werewolf had changed his mind. It was the first thing John said to him when he came through the door.

"I don't think this is a good idea."

"Come on, John, you agreed to it yesterday. You can't simply change your mind now because you're afraid."

John didn't even argue with the accusation. "Look, except for last time, I've made sure that the forest is completely empty and I've been as far away from any living – or, non-living, in your case – being, with the exception of whatever animals live in the trees nearby. And those animals tend to end up dead."

"That is only to be expected. You are a predator, John, and the vast majority of the wildlife that you will find in the forest is your prey. It is natural for you to hunt, and kill them."

"Not reassuring, Sherlock. You're my prey too."

"No, I am your biological enemy."

"Is there a difference?"

"Obviously. I, unlike your prey, stand a chance against you."

"I really don't think this is a good idea. I did some research, you know, on werewolves. If I overpower you even for a second, long enough to break your skin with my teeth, you're as good as dead. Even a scratch will get infected and kill you."

"I'm sure there have been vampires that have survived small werewolf bites, and if not, I will happily be the first."

"Sherlock." John pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes and rubbed them, sighing. "I'd rather you not get bitten at all, and the only way I can make sure of that is if we don't do this."

"You agreed yesterday."

"And now I've had time to think about it, and I've decided that we better not."

"John." Sherlock waited until John had pulled his hands away from his eyes and was looking at him before he continued, "I promised you yesterday that I would make sure you don't cause me any harm, and I intend to keep that. I've had one near-death experience in the past month and I have no intention of repeating that again. Believe me when I say that I can take care of myself, and believe me when I say that there is a very good possibility that this might be beneficial for you in the long run."

John did not speak, but Sherlock could see his resolve breaking; though with obvious reluctance, Sherlock could see the expression on his face becoming more thoughtful, more open to considering Sherlock's suggestion.

The vampire pressed on, "If this works, there is a lot you can gain from it. It would be a mistake for you to refuse this opportunity out of fear."

John sighed, shoulders sagging, and then he walked over to where his coat had been thrown over the arm of his chair. "All right," he said. "Let's go before I change my mind."

OoO

They took a cab to the forest, just as John had done on his own a few times in the past month, and they arrived shortly after closing time. It meant that they had time to kill, waiting until it got a little later so that they could be certain that there would be no one either in the forest or on the road just outside of it. They decided that it was best to go there early than to draw attention to the fact that there were two men lurking around an empty forest at night after all of the centres should have been closed.

It was not hard to pass the time, either, as they spent it wandering through the forest in search of a good place for John to shift. John managed to find conversation topics to fill the time, and it became apparent to Sherlock eventually that the werewolf was talking mostly for the sake of talking, either to keep his mind off what they were about to do or to delay it for as long as possible (it was not immediately apparent which).

It was just when Sherlock was beginning to contemplate the kindest way to tell John to stop stalling and shift (kind only so that John wouldn't decide to change his mind) when John stopped walking, and stopped sighed. "I suppose this is as good a place as any."

Sherlock looked around, taking in the place where they had stopped. It was nowhere near large enough to be considered a clearing, but the trees were far enough apart to give them some space to move, and, if Sherlock's mental map of the forest was correct (which it was, of course), they were far enough away from any of the visiting centres, even though they would be empty at this time of night. "Seems acceptable," he said with a nod of his head, turning his attention back to John. "Whenever you're ready." The last part was added in a tone of voice that seemed to say 'Hurry up'.

"Right," John said, taking a deep breath to ready himself, and then he began to undress. He showed no discomfort with undressing in front of another man, which came as no surprise – John had been in the army, after all, and he was a doctor. He knew as well as anyone that nudity was not an inherently sexual thing. It was also undoubtedly the case that John's mind was too caught up on what he was about to do to worry about anything else. Sherlock averted his gaze nonetheless.

The moment John started to shift, however, Sherlock's full attention was on him once again. It wasn't even more than a minute after he had finished undressing that it began – it was likely that John had gotten better at that since starting to shift voluntarily. It seemed almost effortless, whatever process John took to trigger the change. Sherlock would have to ask him about that when John was capable of speaking English again, to find out what exactly went on in John's head, or in his body, when it began.

The change itself did not seem nearly as effortless. Sherlock watched with avid fascination as the shape of John's body twisted and contorted, bending in ways that it was not supposed to. He heard bones break and watched as they reformed, watched as John's skin stretched over new shapes and grew fur. Sherlock had never seen the change occur this slowly before, not since the very first werewolf he had ever seen shift, and that time he had not been allowed to watch the process the whole way through. This time, he could, satisfying the part of his brain that needed to see and know and understand. More than once, he had the urge to reach out and touch, to see if he could feel the bones moving beneath John's skin, but he decided against it. He didn't know if his touch would affect the change – for all he knew, he could push John's bones out of shape and he could cause more damage.

The process was clearly a painful one, and Sherlock couldn't help the twist in his stomach every time John moaned or cried out in pain. Sherlock had broken his arm as a child, falling out of a tree, and in his early months of being a vampire he had gone through a stage where he had broken his wrist multiple times, intentionally, with the purpose of seeing how his body would heal it. He knew that broken bones were painful, and he could only imagine how much worse it would be, to have every bone in your body breaking and restructuring, with no way of stopping it.

By Sherlock's estimation, the entire process took a little less than half an hour. It wasn't half an hour of non-stop changing, of course – at several points, everything stopped, and John seemed to collapse on the ground as if boneless. The first time it happened, Sherlock reached out for him, unsure if he was okay, but before his hand had made contact, John's body had jerked again, and the process continued. The closer John reached to the end of his transition, the less frequent these pauses became, and finally, after twenty minutes or so, John let out an animalistic howl, and in front of Sherlock stood a wolf.

The creature shook like a dog after a bath, shaking out grey-brown fur, and then he turned to face Sherlock. The vampire could see the tension in his form, the way the hair stood up on the back of his neck.

"John," he said. "Do you recognise me?"

The werewolf growled in response, baring teeth, and Sherlock took that as a no.

Instinct told him, in this situation, to either run and hide or to fight, but Sherlock had never listened too much to his instincts. He stayed where he was, holding his ground. "Focus, John," he said softly. He didn't know if John would understand a word he was saying, but it was worth a shot. "Come on. You know who I am."

The creature growled again, taking half a step backwards, but it wasn't clear if that was to move away or simply to give him the opportunity to take a running lunge. Sherlock thought back to what he could remember of John coming to his rescue, and he remembered the way that the wolf had come to him and lay down beside him. Body language would have to be important to creatures like this. So, slowly, Sherlock raised his hands, and then lowered himself to the ground, to take on a less threatening pose.

"Come on, John," he muttered, barely talking to the werewolf now. "I know you can do this."

Slowly, so slowly, the werewolf stepped forward, nose twitching as he seemed to take in Sherlock's scent. Sherlock kept perfectly still, even though a part of him wanted to move away from the strong jaw and sharp teeth.

He watched as John took him in, and then closed his eyes, and Sherlock saw the way his body relaxed.

There was no drastic change like you might see in a movie, when John opened his eyes again – they had not changed colour or anything of the sort – but Sherlock could swear they seemed more human. He smiled. "Knew you could do it."

He reached out a hand, but John flinched back, and Sherlock held very still until the werewolf relaxed again, moving forward again and nudging Sherlock's hand with his head. The vampire took that as an invitation, and he gently ran his hand through John's fur, paying special attention to the backs of his ears and his neck, because Sherlock could remember his dog enjoying being pet there. The touches seemed to relax John further, and at one point, Sherlock was certain he had seen John's tail wag.

"You're like a puppy," he commented, smirking slightly, and then he drew his hand back, standing up. He looked around the forest, and then turned to John and grinned, tilting his head to one side. "Fancy a run?"


	22. Chapter 22

It was impossible to tell whether or not John could understand English in this form, at least until he shifted back. When Sherlock had been a child, he had taught Redbeard specific words, such as "walk" or "treat" or "bath", and he had also discovered that the dog had at least some understanding of the meanings behind different voice tones. Redbeard understood when Sherlock was saying something particularly exciting, because his tail would wag, and he understood when Sherlock (or, more commonly, Mycroft or Mummy) was scolding him, because he would pin his ears back and tuck his tail between his legs. It did not matter that Redbeard did not know the words that were being said – he knew the meaning behind them.

So, Sherlock was not sure if John was understanding the word 'run' or simply recognising the meaning behind Sherlock's tone of voice, but either way, the question "Fancy a run?" was met with a positive response. John straightened up, and his tail began to wag, like a domestic pet more than a wild beast. Sherlock couldn't help but chuckle at it. There was something almost,  _almost_  cute about the way John looked (but, of course, Sherlock would never use that word).

The vampire straightened up, looking around the forest briefly in an attempt to get an idea of where they were and where they should head. Even if the visitor centres were supposed to be empty by now, it was best to avoid them as much as possible. Sherlock consulted his mental map of the forest, as well as taking into account the density of the trees, at least as far as he could see. He looked back at John, taking in the way he stood – equal weight put on all four of his legs. John had started using his cane less, Sherlock had noticed, but he still favoured one leg when he walked in his human form. Perhaps the conscious awareness that his limp was psychosomatic was not enough to get rid of it completely; perhaps a run, especially if John could remember it, was all John needed.

Sherlock brought one leg forward, taking on a typical runner's starting stance, in the hope that he might convey the message of what he was about to do to John if John could not understand English. Something must have gotten through to the werewolf, at least, because John seemed to take on a similar lunge, as far as a four-legged animal could. Sherlock grinned, and, on the off chance that John could understand him, he said, "Three, two, one."

He took off at a run, and he could hear John's paws slamming against the dirt behind him. John had the advantage of speed – only just, of course, because Sherlock was fast too – but Sherlock was more agile than he was. Having managed to start off ahead, he got to choose the direction that they headed. So, naturally, he chose the hardest direction for John to follow, weaving between tightly-packed trees, taking any twists and turns he could so that they were not running in one straight line. He listened to the sound of John's footsteps as the distance between them increased, John losing ground with every tricky turn that Sherlock made.

When John's footsteps behind him seemed to become quieter and quieter, with the werewolf becoming further and further away, Sherlock slowed, and then frowned, looking over his shoulder. He had squeezed through a gap between a couple of trees that he was certain was too small for the werewolf to fit through, but John was nowhere to be seen. Sherlock frowned, squeezing back through the trees to see where he had lost the werewolf.

There was a bark from somewhere behind him, and he spun around quickly. John had found another way around the trees, somewhere where he could fit, and he had managed to get ahead. The wolf's tail was wagging, and it almost seemed as though the creature was smiling, as much as possible for a wolf. He barked, and then turned and ran off again, this time in the lead of their little race. And Sherlock found he couldn't stop himself from letting out a laugh before he followed.

They raced through the forest for long enough for Sherlock to lose track of the time. It didn't feel like they had been running for very long, but perhaps that was because he found himself having a good time. It was a strange sensation, in truth, finding enjoyment in something as childish as a game of chase, and yet Sherlock found he was smiling without even realising it. There was not enough blood in his system for his heart to pound, but it felt as though there was adrenaline and endorphins rushing through his veins, and he felt  _good_.

Of course, the feeling was not to last.

John came to a stop ahead of him, and Sherlock almost took advantage of the slowing of his footsteps to overtake before he realised that John was not playing their game anymore. The vampire frowned, slowing to a stop as John started to sniff around at the ground, like a police dog on someone's trail. Sherlock watched as the werewolf nosed at the ground, moving leaves and twigs as he sniffed, and then the vampire looked around himself, trying to determine where he was.

Judging by the broken branches, this part of the forest had been passed through recently, within the last couple of weeks. That in and of itself was unremarkable, given this was a forest that people visited all the time, but that could not tell the whole story. No, there would not be this much damage to the trees if people had just been passing through, not unless they were a bunch of particularly rowdy teenagers intent on doing some damage, and that was unlikely, given the place was a nature reserve.

There had been a fight here, and it took Sherlock all of two seconds to realise exactly where he was. He did not need to see any traces of blood or bullets to know that this was where he had been shot.

John was still nosing around at the dirt, and Sherlock wondered, as he moved towards him, if the werewolf had realised the same thing, or if he was simply distracted by the smell of blood, yet to connect the dots. If Sherlock's sense of direction was correct, John was currently sniffing around in the place where the hunter's body would be. Or, at least, parts of the body – Sherlock's memories of everything following John's arrival were fuzzy, but he was reasonably certain that the hunter had not ended up in one piece.

It was strange, however. As he peered over John's shoulder, he realised he could not see any body parts, or even signs of blood. This was not surprising, given that it had been several days since the incident, and surely by now someone would have come across the body and it would have been taken to the morgue. However, it was only now that Sherlock realised he had not heard anything about it, not on the news or in the paper, and he had not been called into investigate it. Perhaps he had simply missed any mention of it in the media, but that seemed unlikely. Something about this seemed off.

Sherlock, it seemed, was not the only one who was getting that feeling. After a few minutes of sniffing around, John turned to face Sherlock and let out a whine, tilting his head to one side. Sherlock sighed.

"I don't speak wolf, John. I can't understand what you're saying."

John let out something that sounded like a growl, but not an aggressive one, and then he started to shift. The movement took Sherlock by surprise, and he took a couple of quick steps backwards, giving John space. The process of shifting back into human form seemed to take about as long as it had taken to shift into wolf form, and it did not appear any less painful, if the sounds that John made were anything to go by. When it was done, the werewolf – now human in appearance – collapsed onto the ground, arms and legs apparently too weak to hold him up. Sherlock took a step forward, for a moment uncertain if John was still conscious, before the werewolf tilted his head so he wasn't breathing in dirt and let out a breathless, humourless laugh.

"How much longer still that stops hurting so much?" he muttered, pushing himself up with his hands and getting to his feet. Sherlock shrugged his coat from his shoulders and handed it over, turning his head to give the werewolf a bit of privacy as John wrapped it around himself.

"Clearly you're getting some results from doing this," Sherlock said. "You're able to start turning immediately. I'm impressed, really." After a moment, he asked, "Did you understand what I was saying the entire time?"

"Most of it, yeah," John said with a nod of his head. "I kind of have to focus harder than usual, but it's not like you're just making sounds or anything." He turned back to where he had been sniffing a moment ago, silently reminding Sherlock that there were more important things to focus on at present than John's ability to turn on command.

"You said Mycroft helped you get me back to your flat," Sherlock said. "Did he say anything about the hunter's body?"

"Or what was left of the hunter's body," muttered John, quiet enough for Sherlock to wonder if he was not supposed to have heard. When John continued speaking, it was significantly clearer. "It wasn't Mycroft himself who came and found us; it was one of his drivers or security guards or something – one of his employees. He didn't really say much at all, to be honest."

Sherlock frowned. It would have made sense for Mycroft to dispose of the body, in order to avoid attention being drawn to werewolves. If the body had been found, however, people would have been more likely to presume that it had been a result of an animal attack. It would lead to problems for the forest, which would likely have to be closed until they could ensure the safety of its visitors, so it wasn't as though Mycroft would not have the motivation to dispose of the body before it could be found by an innocent human.

Mycroft had not mentioned the body of the hunter the last time Sherlock had spoken to him. That did not mean that he had not disposed of the body, of course. However, something about the whole situation still seemed off, even if he could not explain why that was. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, typing out a text to Mycroft as he thought, and then holding his phone in the air as he tried to get enough reception to send it.

          What did you do with  
          the hunter's body?  
          S

"There's a weird smell," John said, drawing Sherlock's attention to him again. "I don't know what it is. It was stronger in my wolf form. I can still smell the hunter's blood, faintly, but there's something else as well. I think someone else was here."

"We're in a public forest, John. I imagine a lot of 'someone else's have been here."

"No, it's not – I don't know how to explain it. Do you think the hunter worked alone?"

"It's hard to say. He might have." Sherlock's phone vibrated and he unlocked the screen, looking over the message.

          I gave my men the job  
          of doing so, but I was  
          informed that the body  
          was already gone by  
          the time they arrived.  
          M

"Or perhaps not," Sherlock murmured, frowning.

          And you didn't think  
          to tell me earlier?  
          S

John was giving him a confused look. "What is it?"

          I hoped you would  
          have had some time  
          to rest and recover  
          before you went off  
          to solve another  
          mystery.  
          M

Sherlock glared at the message, and then pocketed his phone. "I think someone else might have disposed of the body." He looked around, eyes settling on a tree, and he walked over to it, looking closely.

"What are you talking about?" John said behind him.

Sherlock took off his glove, tearing some of the bark off the tree.

"What are you doing?" John asked.

Sherlock was silent for a moment, peeling bark away from the tree, before he managed to achieve his goal, and he turned around, showing John the wooden bullet in his hand. "We might be able to get some information from this," he said, walking over and placing it in one of the pockets of the coat John was still wearing. "Now come on. We need to take a trip to the morgue."

John stared at him for a moment, and then sighed. "At least let me find my clothes first."


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to the brilliant Becca (a.k.a. LlamaWithAPen) for agreeing to help me edit this before I post it. If you guys have spare time, I highly recommend checking out her fic, "Deducing Daisies".

The trip to the morgue confirmed exactly what Sherlock had expected, and precisely what he had feared.

Well, to say that he  _feared_  it was not entirely correct. He knew that it was not a good thing, to discover that the hunter's body had been disposed of by someone other than Mycroft. It implied that the hunter did not work alone, and if the hunter did not work alone, then there was a much larger threat hovering over their heads. Sherlock and John might just be the two creatures in the most danger, as the two creatures responsible for the hunter's death. It was something to be afraid of, Sherlock knew, for someone who did, in fact, experience fear.

However, rather than feeling fear, Sherlock felt excited. This was different. This was something new.

A conversation with Molly Hooper confirmed that there was no one at the morgue who matched the hunter's description – and it would be very difficult for Molly to have made a mistake in confirming this, as a body that "was a victim of an animal attack and will not be in one piece" would not be one she would easily forget. Believing that she was helping with an investigation, Molly was also kind enough to contact people working in the other mortuaries near enough to London to be a possibility, to find out if they had anything to add. Unsurprisingly, no one reported a body of that description; it seemed that the hunter's body had not been found.

When Sherlock reported this to John – who, for reasons Sherlock could not comprehend, had opted for bad coffee at the cafeteria rather than looking at dead bodies – the werewolf rubbed his eyes and let out a sigh. "Great," he muttered. "So that means we have another hunter who's going to try to kill you?"

"Or you," Sherlock said, as if it was supposed to be reassuring. (It wasn't.) "Of course, it's also a possibility that we do not have another hunter. Whoever removed the hunter's body might not have been a hunter at all. If it was a person tasked specifically with the job of removing any evidence in the case of the hunter's death, however, it seems more likely that this hunter was part of a larger organisation than working on his own."

"Is this supposed to be comforting?"

"Why should I try to comfort you? You're a soldier, John, you don't need to be mollycoddled and you don't need the truth sugar-coated. What good is it if you feel safe and sound when the truth of the matter is that we are both in danger?"

"Remind me to never ask you for reassurance." John sighed, and drained the rest of his coffee, tossing the disposable cup in the bin. "All right. So, we may have an entire organisation of vampire hunters coming after us. What do we do first?"

Sherlock frowned in thought for a moment, patting his pockets. "I need to get something from my flat before we go anywhere new," he said. "You might as well tag along. Maybe something in the files from my earlier investigation will shed some light on something."

OoO

John had only visited Sherlock's flat once before, and that was on the occasion after Sherlock had come by Mycroft's basement when John was in there, on the night of the full moon. That was only a matter of months ago, and yet it felt like another lifetime. John had not paid very much attention to Sherlock's flat that time, far too distracted by his own anger, and then their tussle on the floor to take in anything in the flat. He made up for that now, looking around the room as Sherlock led him inside.

The place was a mess, to say the least. John could not see the desk or the table under piles of paper and laboratory equipment. It would be impossible to sit down and eat at either of them, although that would not be a problem for a vampire who only required blood for nourishment. The place looked like it had not been tidied for months, but it did not look dusty. Someone must be keeping the place at least a little bit clean, John thought. He was reasonably certain that that someone was not Sherlock.

The objects littered around the flat were certainly interesting to look at, however. Most of them appeared to serve a practical purpose – the science equipment, the map on the wall, the many shelves of books (mostly non-fiction, judging by the titles that John could see, and many related to criminal investigations) – but some of the items did not appear to serve a particular purpose other than for decoration, and Sherlock's way of decorating seemed rather unique. There was a bison skull attached to the wall overlooking the desk, wearing headphones, and on the mantelpiece a dagger was apparently being used in place of a paperweight. The item next to the dagger, in particular, caught John's attention.

"That's a skull," he stated. Sherlock glanced at him, and then at the skull, nodding once.

"Friend of mine. Well, I say friend." He walked over to the desk beneath the bison skull, and John saw him pick something up and put it in his pocket, although the werewolf did not get the chance to see what it was. The vampire then shuffled through some of the papers for a moment before he glanced up at John. "Do you require... food or drink of some form? Mrs Hudson tends to keep the kitchen stocked. Feel free to help yourself."

John smiled slightly. "I might have some tea, actually," he said, moving towards the kitchen to see if Sherlock had any. "Do you need blood, or..." He trailed off, glancing at his now-healed wrist. His conversation with Mycroft immediately sprung to mind.  _Your blood sharing will not leave his mind as quickly as it may leave yours._

Sherlock, however, did not even ask for any more of John's blood – or any blood at all, for that matter. He merely said, "No, I'm fine," and fell silent, apparently distracted by whatever papers he was looking at.

John hesitated for a moment, looking over at the vampire. Sherlock was looking pale – even more so than usual, although, with the colour of his skin, that could very well just be the lighting – and John wondered if he should insist. He would not have to offer his own blood, of course. Maybe he could just find Sherlock's stash of blood bags and heat one up; maybe if he put it in front of Sherlock, the vampire would end up drinking it anyway.

He put the kettle on, and he moved over to the fridge to see if Sherlock had any milk. He managed to find Sherlock's stash of blood bags in the process; he could see that the draw at the bottom of the fridge was filled to the top with them. He also found the milk, but when he opened the lid the smell made him decide that he would be better off drinking his tea black.

"Doesn't your landlady ever wonder why you have more blood in the fridge than actual food?" he said as he poured the milk down the sink, turning on the tap to wash it away.

"She tends to assume, as does everyone, that it is all part of an experiment," Sherlock replied. "She has come across enough body parts in the fridge to become used to it. Occasionally she does end up throwing it all away, unfortunately, when she decides that stocking the fridge with food is more important than whatever experiment I might be doing."

"Body parts?" John looked over his shoulder, and Sherlock met his eyes, looking amused.

"Those are for actual experiments. I'm a vampire, John, not a cannibal."

"Seems like kind of a fine line to me."

Sherlock let out a sound of amusement, and he returned his attention to the papers in front of him. John hesitated for a moment, still waiting for the kettle to finish boiling, before he asked, "How often do you feed?"

"When I require it."

"Fine, how often are you supposed to feed?"

Sherlock shrugged his shoulders, making a dismissive gesture with his hand. "Once a week or so."

"Once a week?" John repeated. He hesitated for a second, but then decided that it was as good a time as any to bring it up. "Your brother told me you're supposed to feed every two or three days."

Sherlock looked up quickly, narrowing his eyes at John. "You spoke to my brother?" he said, his tone of voice sounding both accusing and affronted. "When?"

"He didn't exactly give me a choice. He basically abducted me after work. It was after you got shot."

"What did he want?"

_Ask him about Victor Trevor_ , said Mycroft's voice in his head. He shook it off.

"He wanted to talk about your feeding habits. I think he doubted you were going to take care of yourself properly, which kind of seems like a fair enough concern, considering."

Sherlock was silent for a moment, staring at John in the way that made John feel as though he was being analysed from the inside out, and then he asked, "Did he ask you to become my feeder?"

The kettle whistled behind him, and John was grateful for the excuse to turn around, to turn his attention to something other than Sherlock. "He... kind of talked as if that was inevitable."

Behind him, Sherlock let out a frustrated noise. "He's been trying to get me to take a feeder for years, because he can't seem to keep his big nose out of other people's business. He probably thinks I'd feed more if it was coming from someone who could keep track of that. Just because having a walking blood bag suits him does not mean that every vampire in the universe should follow in his oversized footsteps."

John glanced over his shoulder, absently jiggling the tea bag in the cup of boiling water. "So… you  _don't_  want a feeder?"

Sherlock met his gaze and smirked slightly. "Why, are you offering?" he said, and his tone of voice sounded teasing, joking, but with Sherlock, you could never be too sure. John turned back to his mug quickly.

"No! No, I mean... I was just curious, that's all."

Sherlock let out a slight chuckle. "Relax, John, I'm not about to ask you to become a regular feeder. Blood bags are infinitely more convenient, and I highly doubt you would be willing. Werewolves aren't exactly known to make for good vampire feeders."

"Right. Okay, good," John said, throwing away the teabag, lifting his mug to his lips and blowing on it. After a moment, he said, "You probably should feed, though. Your brother is probably right, if he's telling you to feed every few days. I can heat up a bag…"

"Don't bother." Sherlock made a dismissive hand gesture, and turned his attention back to the papers in front of him. "I'm not hungry."

John fell silent for a moment, taking a sip of his tea while he decided whether or not he should continue to insist, but Sherlock moved suddenly before he had the chance. He slammed his hands onto the desk and stood quickly, shoving the chair back with enough force to make John start, spilling hot tea over his fingers.

"Jesus Christ!" he hissed, putting down the cup and turning back to the sink to wash the tea off his hands. "What was that about?"

"There's nothing here!" Sherlock replied, shoving the papers off the desk. They fluttered to the floor, falling into a messy pile around the table legs. John lifted his mug up again, taking a long gulp, as he doubted he was going to have a chance to sit and enjoy his tea for much longer.

"Sherlock," he said, and when the only response he got was for Sherlock to start pacing he added, "Sherlock, calm down."

"I am calm!" Sherlock replied in a very not-calm tone of voice. He ruffled his hair with his hands, and then moved towards the doorway. "There was nothing here to suggest that the hunter worked with anyone at all. I should have seen something; there should have been some sort of clue to suggest he had a partner or an organisation or  _something_!"

"So you made a mistake. It's fine."

"I do not make mistakes. Idiots make mistakes."

"Sherlock," John began, but the vampire whirled around before he had a chance to finish the sentence, coat flying out around him.

"Come on, John!" he said, making his way out the door without waiting for a response, and John sighed before lifting his cup to his lips and draining the rest of his tea.  _So much for a moment to relax._


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for proofreading this for me before I posted it. You should all definitely check out her fic, Deducing Daisies.

It was not until they had been in the cab for about fifteen minutes that John decided it was a good idea to ask where they were going.

"To my brother's," Sherlock replied, the expression on his face making it apparent that this was something of a last resort, and something that Sherlock was not pleased to be doing. That came as no surprise to John. If he had learnt anything about Sherlock in the past few months, it was that Sherlock did not get along with, or like, his brother, and John could only imagine how unpleasant it must have felt for someone like Sherlock to ask for help.

He wondered if Sherlock and Mycroft had gotten along when they were human. Had Mycroft's decision to turn Sherlock without Sherlock's agreement been the reason their relationship went downhill, or did they simply fail to get along from the start? The way Sherlock spoke of his brother made it seem as though it was more than just the childish bickering. John had never gotten along with Harry, but he would not call her his 'arch enemy', as Sherlock had called his brother.

He considered asking, but, judging by the intense look of thought on Sherlock's face, it was not the right time. Instead, John filed it away in his mind for something that he and Sherlock could discuss when their minds were not on the possibility of being hunted by an organisation of hunters.

When the cab pulled up in front of Mycroft's house (or mansion, as John still thought of it), Sherlock instructed the driver to wait outside, informing him that they would only be a few minutes, before he climbed out, and John was quick to join him. He followed Sherlock to the door and was surprised to find the vampire pulling out the object he had taken from his flat – a key – rather than ringing the doorbell.

"Shouldn't we knock?" John asked. "I mean, what if he's busy?"

"My brother is always busy. Knocking is a waste of time."

"But what if he's – I mean, shouldn't we give him a chance to get ready before we barge in there?"

Sherlock gave him a look. "You're so polite, it's unnerving. In any case, my brother, like all vampires, has enhanced hearing, so I'd bet he's already heard us coming, and if he hasn't, he'll hear me opening the door. It will give him more than enough time to prepare, so don't worry that we're going to interrupt him unexpectedly." Sherlock pushed the key into the lock and then paused, and said, "The only way he would not hear would be if he were distracted by feeding. But that would mean breaking his routine of feeding only first thing in the morning, so that's not very likely." He shuddered slightly at the image in his mind, and then turned the key and pushed open the door.

Sherlock walked into the building as if he owned the place, but John could not help but hesitate just for a moment. It did not feel right to just barge in there unannounced, even though this was Sherlock's brother. That said, however, it had not been right for Mycroft to send a car for him unannounced and take John to an abandoned building without giving him the option to say no, so John followed Sherlock through the door.

Sherlock was right, it seemed. The vampire led him straight into Mycroft's living room, and the elder Holmes brother did not seem even the slightest bit surprised when they came through the door. He merely gestured to the sofa across from him. "Good afternoon, Sherlock, Doctor Watson. To what do I owe this pleasure?"

"Skip the pleasantries, Mycroft," Sherlock said. "You know why we're here. I'm sure you've not been idle in the time that you kept this from me."

Rather than responding to Sherlock, Mycroft turned his attention to John. "Would you like anything to drink, Doctor Watson? I can have my assistant bring you up some tea, if you would like."

John opened his mouth to respond, but Sherlock got there first. "He doesn't want tea. Files, Mycroft. Now."

"Always the impatient one," Mycroft tutted, but he did turn his attention to his assistant, standing by the door. "Anthea, would you mind retrieving the files on my desk?"

The woman nodded her head once and turned, disappearing out the door.

"I thought her name wasn't Anthea," John said before he could stop himself. Mycroft gave him an amused look.

"It is for the moment."

John did not know what to say to that, so he kept quiet, glancing over at Sherlock, who had taken to wandering through Mycroft's living room rather than standing in wait. He opened up drawers and looked around in the same way that John had seen him do in John's own bedsit, and he was more surprised to discover that Mycroft did not seem to care. Perhaps this was just something Sherlock did, something that those who knew him were used to.

John made a mental note to hide anything that he did not want Sherlock to see somewhere other than in his cupboard or drawers.

When Anthea – or whatever her real name was – returned, she was carrying with her a thick folder filled with papers and photographs. It instantly drew Sherlock's attention away from the drawers, and he intercepted her on her way to Mycroft, holding out his hand.

She looked over his shoulder to where Mycroft was sitting, and when her employer nodded his head, she handed the file over to Sherlock. He opened it up, flicking through the papers as he walked over to the sofa that Mycroft was not sitting on. "Did you know that he wasn't working alone?" he asked.

Mycroft shook his head. "I'm afraid I did not discover that until my men informed me that his body had been moved before they got there," he said. "I've since been trying to determine whether he simply had a partner, or partners, or if he was part of an organisation. Everything I've found is in that file."

"And what have you found?"

"He certainly has a partner – the information on her is in that file. Whether or not they are part of a larger network is yet to be determined."

Sherlock flicked through the file again, lingering on a page that appeared to be information on the female partner, before closing it quickly. "I'm sure we can make do with this," he said, standing up and tucking the folder underneath his arm. He turned to John, and then he was struck by a thought, and he slipped his hand into his coat pocket, pulling out the small wooden bullet that he had dug out from the tree. He walked over, and dropped it into Mycroft's extended hand.

"I don't want to get our dear detective inspector involved, because he'll have far too many questions to ask. I'm certain you have people who can analyse that for me."

Mycroft studied the bullet for a moment before nodding his head. "I'll see what I can do."

Sherlock nodded once. "Good," he said, and then he turned away. "Come along, John."

John looked over at Mycroft, wondering if he should say some sort of goodbye, but he hesitated at the odd look that Mycroft was giving him.

"Normally, I'd worry for any unfortunate being that my brother is pulling into his reckless ploys," he said, "but in your case, I think you might be good for him. Good day, Doctor Watson. Do make sure my brother does not do anything stupid – or, at least, more stupid than can be expected."

John stared at Mycroft for a moment, before Sherlock called "Come on, John!" from outside the door, and John scurried off after him.

OoO

Sherlock instructed the cab driver to take them back to 221B Baker Street, and when he did not give John the opportunity to give his own address as well, John presumed that it meant that Sherlock wanted John to come home with him. Perhaps he wanted John's help, in some sense or another. However, when the cab did pull up outside the flat, Sherlock climbed out without a word, leaving John to pay the driver (John muttered a couple of choice words under his breath as he handed the money over), and by the time he had gotten back upstairs, Sherlock had resumed his place at the desk, the new file open in front of him.

"Right," John said.

Sherlock said nothing, and John then asked, "Do you want me to...?" He trailed off, uncertain of what, exactly, he could offer to do. Sherlock, however, did not seem to be paying attention at all, so John decided there was no point in finishing that sentence anyway. Instead, he moved into the kitchen, putting the kettle on again. After all, if Sherlock's landlady was going to buy food and tea even though Sherlock would not eat or drink any of it, there was no point in letting it go to waste.

He hesitated as he took a mug from the cupboard, glancing over his shoulder at Sherlock. Sherlock had only ever looked pale, whenever John had seen him, so it was impossible to tell whether the way he looked at that moment was sickly pale for a vampire or not. However, Sherlock had told him that he only fed once a week – or, that he was only "supposed to" feed once a week, so perhaps the vampire was feeding even less than that – and Mycroft had told him that Sherlock needed to feed every few days. This time, John figured Mycroft was probably the more reliable source.

He pulled another mug out of the cupboard and then walked over to the fridge, leaning down to open up the drawer at the bottom. He lifted up a couple of bags, studying the labels on them. There were several different blood types in there, and John wondered if each type tasted different. Did Sherlock have a preference? He glanced over his shoulder, but Sherlock still seemed to be immersed in the papers, more or less oblivious to what John was doing. So, John took the A positive bag that was sitting on the top of the pile and carried it over to where he had left the mugs.

He grabbed a kitchen knife to cut open the bag, wrinkling his nose at the smell, and he poured it into the mug, glancing over his shoulder as he did. Sherlock was still staring at the papers on his desk, but he seemed to be sitting up a little bit straighter. One hand had been clenched into a fist on his knee.

John put the mug into the microwave, hesitating for a moment with uncertainty before putting it on for a minute, and then he returned to his own mug, pouring the boiling water from the kettle into it. He drummed his fingertips on the counter, waiting for the microwave to finish, and when it did, he took out the mug, making sure to breathe through his mouth so that the smell did not turn him off his tea, and he walked over to where Sherlock was sitting, putting it down carefully so it did not rest on top of any of the papers.

Sherlock glanced towards it for a fraction of a second, before pointedly moving his gaze back to the files, staring at them with an intensity that suggested he was making an effort not to look at either John or the mug of blood. "I told you I didn't want any."

"Really? I must have missed that. Oh well, if you don't want it, it can just sit there until it goes cold. You've got plenty in the fridge, it won't matter that this one mug will go to waste, will it?"

Sherlock did not reply, instead turning the page of the file with a little more force than necessary.

"Suit yourself. I'm just going to go use the bathroom." John turned around and disappeared into the room in question, leaving Sherlock on his own.

When he returned a few moments later, Sherlock had not moved from his place at the desk, but the mug beside him was empty. John smiled.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is being translated into Russian! Check it out here: http://ficbook.net/readfic/3017168/7954090
> 
> Once again, thank you all so, so much for the response you've given this fic. I did not expect anything nearly this amazing.

By the time John had finished his cup of tea, Sherlock had failed to say even a single word to him, and so the werewolf decided that it was best to leave the vampire to his own devices. John was no detective. He did not think himself unintelligent, but he knew he did not have intelligence to match Sherlock's, and, if Sherlock's stories of the cases he consulted on were anything to go by, the vampire had this all under control. He left with a reminder that Sherlock was more than welcome to text him if he could offer any assistance, but Sherlock's silence told him that that assistance was not likely to be necessary.

It wasn't until after John had gotten back to his bedsit and settled down at his desk that he realised that he had not been limping since they had left the forest.

OoO

When two days passed without a particular vampire turning up to join him on his walks to and from the Tube station, or otherwise making any effort to contact John, the werewolf decided it was a good idea to go and find out what he was up to. It was not the first time that Sherlock had gone several days without visiting, even when they were on good terms, and yet it felt stranger this time, more out of place. That, and John could not deny his own investment in what Sherlock was researching. After all, it was because of him that Sherlock had not ended up dead at the hands of the hunter.

(Not that he was going to feel in any way smug about that, of course.)

It was not Sherlock who answered the door when he knocked on it, but instead an elderly woman whose name he did not know. He had met her only briefly, the first time he had come there. She had been the one to answer the door then as well, and John had not even bothered to say hello before he had pushed past her and stormed up the stairs to yell at Sherlock. Seeing her face made his stomach twist with guilt.

"Hi," he said, somewhat awkwardly. "Um. I'm John. Sorry I didn't... introduce myself properly last time."

The woman smiled at him in a way that John did not think he deserved, after the way that he had treated her last time. "Oh, that's perfectly all right, dear," she said, stepping to the side and holding the door open for him. "I'm Mrs Hudson. You are here for Sherlock, yes? I thought I heard you upstairs a few days ago."

"Ah, yeah, that was me. Sorry I didn't come and say hi."

"Oh, it's no matter. I'm his landlady, dear, not his mother; I don't expect to be introduced to all of his guests. Still, I am glad to see that the two of you are getting along, after I heard you yelling a couple of months ago. He doesn't really have many friends, you see. I don't think he tries to get close to people. It's not very good for him, is it? The poor dear."

John stared at her for a moment, not sure how to respond, and she seemed to come back to reality, blinking. "Oh, where are my manners?" she said with a laugh. "You don't want to be down here talking with me. Sherlock's just upstairs."

"Right," said John, nodding. "Ah, thanks."

Mrs Hudson smiled, and then she turned to head back into what must have been her flat, and John made his way up the stairs.

When he reached the top, he thought, for a moment, that Sherlock had not moved since the last time John had seen him. At a second glance, however, it became clear that that was not the case. For one thing, the mug that John had put on the desk for Sherlock to drink out of had been moved, and as John's gaze wandered around the room, he realised that the walls had been covered with several pictures and post-it notes, creating some sort of mind-map – a crime map, perhaps? Whatever the map was supposed to show did not jump out at John very easily.

"You've been busy," John commented. Sherlock glanced up at him.

"I said could you pass me a pen."

John frowned. "What, when?"

"A couple of hours ago."

"You realise that I've only just gotten here, right? I've not been here for the last two days."

"Haven't you?" said Sherlock, in an absent tone of voice.

"No, I haven't," John said, looking around and then grabbing the first pen he could see and tossing it at the vampire. Sherlock caught it with one hand, and used it to circle something on one of the pages in front of him before he pulled out a photograph.

"Come have a look at this," he said. John walked over, leaning over Sherlock's shoulder to examine the photograph in front of him. It was the woman that Mycroft had determined was the hunter's partner; the image had been zoomed in to focus on her face, cutting off below her shoulders. The picture was not of particularly good quality, but John was fairly certain she did not look familiar to him in any way. He wasn't sure if she was supposed to.

"What's interesting about this picture?" Sherlock said, tilting his head to watch John as he studied the image. John tried, he really did; he looked for anything unusual that Sherlock might want to draw his attention to, but he could not see anything. If he had passed this woman in the street, he would have never given her a second glance, never thought that she might be a hunter or otherwise associated with one.

"I don't know," he said, and Sherlock let out an exasperated sigh.

"Her neck, John. What's interesting about her neck?"

John changed his line of focus, studying the woman's neck. He could not see anything unusual on it – it was not as though she had any tattoos or unusual markings that suggested she was part of some sort of organisation, except for a couple of small spots of colour on the side of her neck.

John frowned, leaning in closer to the image. "Are they..."

"Puncture wounds," Sherlock finished with a nod of his head. "She's been bitten."

"Does that mean she's a vampire?"

Sherlock shook his head. "If she were, her body would have healed the marks by now. She's human – or perhaps another creature that does not have increased healing abilities, but human is the most likely. And, she's been fed from. I don't think that's coincidence, do you?"

"That she's been bitten by a vampire and hunting vampires? Probably not. So, what, this is some sort of revenge thing?"

"No, that's not very likely. Remember what I told you about vampire venom?"

John frowned in thought to the text conversation they had had several months ago. "You said it was like a drug."

Sherlock nodded. "It keeps humans coming back for more. I also told you that it could cause feelings of attachment, yes?"

John nodded.

"In some people, that can manifest as a desire to... please their vampire, perhaps by doing whatever they ask."

"Wait. So, you're saying that whoever bit her is... hypnotizing her?"

"Not precisely. She still has free will, of course. She does not have to do as she is asked. However, she may feel a heightened desire to do so, and perhaps she is receiving something else by doing this vampire's bidding as well, just to further convince her."

John frowned. "But why would a vampire try to convince someone to kill other vampires?"

"Why do humans kill other humans?"

"Good point."

Sherlock turned his attention back to the pages in front of him, and John slid down into the chair opposite him. "Did the other hunter – had he been bitten, too?"

"We have no way of knowing. I would assume so, but, unfortunately, the security footage that Mycroft has given me only ever caught him wearing high-collared clothing or scarves. It may have been an intentional effort to hide the marks."

"Or it may have just been his choice in fashion."

"Precisely."

John leaned back in the chair, thinking. "So, we have at least one, maybe two – maybe even more – hunters working for a vampire, who is intent on... wiping out other vampires?"

Sherlock did not reply for several moments, and John cleared his throat, unsure if he had been heard.

"It's kind of weird, isn't it?" he said, raising his voice just a little to try to get Sherlock's attention.

Again, this was met with no reply from the vampire. John sighed.

"Are you always like this when you're on cases?"

This time, Sherlock did respond. His gaze flickered up to John and he seemed to raise his eyebrows a little before looking back down at the pages again. "Sometimes I don't talk for days on end," he said. "Why, does that bother you?"

A ghost of a smile flickered over John's face. "You know what, not really," he said. "Sometimes it's impossible to get you to shut up. This might be a nice change."

Sherlock's gaze remained fixed on the file, but John could have sworn he saw an eye roll.

After a moment – a = silent moment, of course – John decided to speak again. "Okay, maybe this time I do actually want you to speak. I can help. I want to help."

Sherlock looked up at him, the expression on his face sceptical. "You? John, you might not be a complete imbecile, but I certainly do not expect your intelligence to be anywhere near enough to match the apparent intelligence of this vampire. There is very little that you can do to assist me."

It took John a moment to answer, because he was trying to work out if that was a compliment wrapped up in an insult or an insult wrapped up in a compliment. He shook the thought off; he could consider Sherlock's thoughts on his intelligence later. "Are we forgetting the fact that I did save your life?"

"That shows nothing of your intelligence, John. That came down to your strength alone – and, might I add, the fact that the hunter was prepared for a vampire, not for a werewolf."

"Intelligent or not, I saved your life. And if there is a whole organisation of these hunters, I might need to do it again."

Sherlock gave him a look.

"Look, just hear me out," John sighed. "I don't know if I'll be able to help you actually work anything out, fair enough. I know that you will, given the way you solve cases. Just keep me in the loop, yeah? This whole investigation thing is not going to only involve you sitting in your flat staring at files; you're going to need to go out and hunt the hunters. And that's when things are going to get messy and that's when I can help."

Sherlock was silent for the longest moment, long enough for John to begin to think that the vampire was not going to accept his offer, but then, at last, Sherlock sighed. He dragged his chair around the table so that he was sitting adjacent to John rather than across from him, and he rotated the papers so that they could both read them. "All right," he said. "Here's what we know."

OoO

It took Sherlock the better part of an hour to explain his findings from the last couple of days, complete with elaborate hand gestures and dramatic pointing towards points on the map or the pictures on the walls. Sherlock frequently went off on tangents about precisely how he had discovered this fact or another, and a lot of these did not make sense to John, but the werewolf chose not to ask questions. As long as he understood the conclusion that Sherlock had eventually come to, the rest did not matter.

The most important fact to note was that the hunter and his partner were not the only two people involved in this mess. Sherlock, apparently, had spent the past couple of days trying to work out exactly who else was involved, using information from security footage, passenger information from flights, and so on. He looked for people who had arrived in the same areas that the hunter had at approximately the same time, for people who seemed to have travelled with the hunter. He had also been looking for other disappearances or deaths of supernatural creatures outside of England, making the assumption that everything was connected.

This organisation seemed to spread far beyond England. Sherlock had not even looked at every country in the world, and yet he had already found what seemed to be the beginnings of a very intricate web. It wasn't just vampires that were being hunted, but werewolves as well, and even some human deaths had caught Sherlock's attention. John didn't understand how he could be certain that all of this was related – maybe he wasn't certain, maybe it was all assumptions – but Sherlock was not ignoring any possibility that everything was linked in one way or another.

He had found several names that seemed to be associated with either the hunter or his partner, and he gave John an overview of the information on them. The way that the vampire spoke about it made it seem as though this was only the tip of the iceberg. This went down far deeper than either of them could imagine.

When Sherlock finally finished, John was silent for several moments, processing the information, before he asked, "So, what do we do?"

Sherlock steepled his fingers together underneath his chin and smiled, a far-off expression on his face. "We follow this web to the vampire at the centre."


	26. Chapter 26

This was not like any other case that Sherlock had worked on.

A normal investigation, regardless of the actual case itself, followed a similar sort of pattern and routine. It would begin with Sherlock doing background research, collecting information and studying evidence, whether it be evidence he found on his own or evidence that was given to him by (or taken from) the police of New Scotland Yard. He would use this information to get an idea of their criminal mastermind (or idiotic criminal, depending on the case) behind it, and to work out the best way to either find them or lure them out. This would often result in a chase or a fight, or some form of physical confrontation, that would eventually end with said criminal mastermind/idiotic criminal revealing everything and being arrested. They would end up in handcuffs, and Sherlock would tell Lestrade (or whatever other detective inspector was on the case) to leave him out of the report.

A normal investigation would take anywhere between a couple of hours and a few days, maybe a week if it was particularly complicated. Sherlock would stop feeding, stop experimenting, and dedicate all his time and attention to the case until it was solved. Only then would he return to doing non-case related research or experiments, and taking care of his body by feeding. Given how short these cases seemed to last, it did not matter that this was the way that he would act.

This case was different. This case could not be considered a single case; it was a case wrapped in a case, drowned in another case, tied to several other cases, all tangled up in a web. It would not take a few days, or even a week – already, it had taken several months, just to track one hunter, one single strand of this complicated web. It could take even longer to follow each strand to the centre. He could not dedicate all of his attention to it, because it was an unfortunate case that involved a lot of waiting – waiting for someone to make a move, for something to come up. It was a case with a lot of down-time, a lot of waiting around, and that was not the kind of case that Sherlock enjoyed.

He could not starve himself for the entire case, either, because he would end up dead if he tried. That was not to say that he was feeding regularly, or that he wanted to feed when he did, but even Sherlock knew when it was necessary to consume blood so that he could function at full capacity. It helped that John was making sure he was feeding at least somewhat regularly.

John was the other variable that set this case apart from any other cases. Sherlock had never had a partner before, or a colleague. He had worked with the Yard, in a manner of speaking, but he would never have considered them his partners in work. On many occasions, the relationship between him and whoever else was working on the case was the furthest thing from a partnership. Many of the officers openly despised him, and he did not pretend that the feeling was not mutual. John was the first partner that he had ever had, and the first person that he had ever worked with who he wanted to work with. It was a feeling that surprised him more than it must have surprised John.

John was not a genius, and no one would ever mistake him for one. Sherlock had to slow himself down many times to explain to John what was going on, and on more than one occasion, when John had simply nodded in response, Sherlock knew that he did not really understand. However, John was not an idiot, either. In fact, some of the knowledge that John had from his experience as a doctor was rather insightful. John could help him determine the cause of death or injury, and John could look at what appeared to be open-and-shut cases and to help him work out if the cause of death was really what it seemed to be.

John also proved himself useful in other ways, ways that Sherlock had not even considered. This became apparent to him one day, when he was called in to consult on a case not related to the hunter organisation.

Sherlock had been with John that morning when Lestrade had called. He had considered refusing it, because of his own investigation, but they had only begun investigating the web a few days ago, so it was not as though he would be distracted from anything urgent. Besides, the case that Lestrade described over the phone sounded ordinary, barely over a five, and it was likely something he could solve with just a glance at the crime scene. It was the kind of case he would normally refuse, but, given that Lestrade had withheld cases from him as some form of punishment for his months of silence, he figured he should take what he could get and work his way back up to the more interesting cases.

So, Sherlock had hung up the phone, and turned to John with the intention of telling him that he was needed for a case and that he would tell John about it in an hour or so when he solved it and returned.

What came out of his mouth instead was "Want to see a dead body?"

(Sherlock did, of course, have to backtrack and explain that his assistance was required at a crime scene and John's experience as an army doctor, who would have seen a lot of gruesome deaths and injuries and therefore would not be overwhelmed by the sight of another one, would greatly assist him. It was only after he did that that John agreed, with a look of what might have been amusement on his face that told Sherlock that John knew what he had meant from the start.)

It seemed logical, to Sherlock, to bring the werewolf along for the case, given John's experience and expertise, as well as his presence when Sherlock had been called. Detective Inspector Lestrade, unfortunately, did not share these thoughts.

"Who's this?" he asked as Sherlock held up the police tape for John to step underneath.

"He's with me," Sherlock responded, but this, apparently, was not enough for Lestrade.

"Yes, but who is he? You can't just bring civilians onto a crime scene."

"He's not a civilian."

"Then who  _is_  he?"

John shifted his weight between his feet awkwardly. "Maybe it would be better if I waited out here."

Sherlock all but cut him off with a "No", before turning his attention back to Lestrade. "This is  _Doctor_  Watson," he said, emphasising the title.

Lestrade gave John little more than a glance, before turning his attention back to Sherlock. "We've got a whole team of people, you know. You don't need to bring your own doctor."

"Do you want me to take a look at your crime scene or not?"

The expression on Lestrade's face said that he could see where this conversation was going, and he did not like it. "Well, yeah, I wouldn't have called you if I didn't."

"Then Doctor Watson comes with me."

What followed this was not a verbal response, but instead what would look, to an outsider, like a staring competition. With Sherlock, it was always a battle of wills. Lestrade gave Sherlock a look that said 'I'm breaking enough rules letting you in here; I can't let him in as well'. Sherlock gave Lestrade a look that said 'But you need me, and I'm not giving you another option.'

Unsurprisingly, Lestrade was the one to give in. After about a minute of intense staring, his shoulders sagged, and he sighed. "Fine," he muttered, pressing the heels of his palms to his eyes. "Fine. But I'm giving you five minutes in there."

The Detective Inspector turned away, and Sherlock shot John a grin.

Lestrade led the two of them into the house and up the stairs, talking as he went. "Victim's name is Rachel Jackson. She works the late shifts at a bar – co-worker came over when she didn't show up for work last night. Door was locked, the landlord let him in. Cause of death wasn't immediately apparent – looks to be drug-related."

"But...?" Sherlock prompted. A drug overdose would not be a reason to call in a consultant.

"But," Lestrade continued, "there are no signs of drugs anywhere in her apartment, and on top of that, we found a puncture wound on the back of her neck, below her left ear. I'm sure you'll agree that that's a bit of an unusual location for someone to inject themselves."

They stepped through the open door of the bedroom, and Sherlock saw John stiffen out of the corner of his eye, even though this could not be anywhere near as gruesome as some of the images that the war would have left him with. The body was lying on her back the bed, head tilted slightly to one side. If you ignored the fact that her chest was not moving, and she looked far too pale, you might have thought she was asleep. She did not look like she had been afraid or panicked in her last moments alive; there was no sign that she had struggled at all. The black dress she wore clung tightly to her body – clearly the sort of thing one might wear to a nightclub or a bar, and not the sort of thing that one would wear to bed.

The only way in or out of the room was either through the window or through the door. There was no sign of forced entry on either; the window was locked from the inside. Sherlock scanned around the room as he put on a rubber glove, eyes settling on her purse, which lay open on the bench across from her bed, next to a large television screen. He used one finger to open up the purse, peering inside, and moving a couple of things around just to confirm his suspicions regarding what would be missing.

"He took her keys."

"He?" repeated Lestrade. Sherlock resisted the urge to sigh (which was difficult, given the strength of the urge).

"Statistically more likely. Look at the way she's dressed – clearly, she caught someone's attention last night and took him home. It explains how he got in without having to force it." He went to straighten up, and then paused, frowning, as something caught his eye.

He reached out with one finger, dragging it along the surface of the bench and gathering dust. The woman was tidy, clearly dusting regularly – there would be far more dust there if she did not – but there was still a small build-up of it from the past few days, with the exception of one circular patch next to the television.

"He took something," Sherlock said, holding up one dusty, gloved finger. "Something was here before, but it's been taken. I would assume some sort of vase or decorative ornament, undoubtedly something of value – or, at least, something that appears to be of value. It seems unlikely that he would have planned on taking it – it would have caught his eye and he would have taken it as an afterthought."

He studied the dust-free circle closely, trying to visualise the ornament that had once sat in that space. It was not a small figure, by any definition. Depending on its height, it could fit in a backpack, but surely a woman would have found it unusual for a man to come with her carrying such a large bag. Additionally, it was unlikely that the man would have had a bag that size with him, if taking the item had, indeed, been an afterthought.

"Sherlock."

It was John's voice that brought Sherlock out of his mind; the werewolf had crouched behind him, leaning in close and speaking in a low voice that seemed to command that Sherlock pay attention immediately. He turned his head just enough to see John out of the corner of his eye, giving him a look that said 'What?'

"I don't think this guy left the building. The cologne – can you smell it?"

Sherlock inhaled through his nose. There was a faint scent still lingering in the air, and it was likely that only he and John could smell it, given the strength of their senses. Given the expression on John's face, Sherlock gathered that the smell was a lot stronger for the werewolf.

"I could smell it downstairs too," John murmured. "Stronger."

Sherlock stood to his feet suddenly, startling John and almost causing him to fall off-balance. Lestrade immediately clicked onto the fact that something had happened, asking urgently, "What? What is it?"

Sherlock could not say that he knew that the culprit was still in the building because he could smell him, so instead he used the next best explanation. "Someone would have seen him if he tried to carry something like that out of the building. It's likely that he's waiting, perhaps for an accomplice or perhaps for nightfall so he can sneak out. Search the building. Now."

As John had suggested, they found the man downstairs, hidden in a storage cupboard. He tried to run when they found him, but very few people can outrun a vampire, and it only took them a matter of minutes to have him cuffed and on the way down to the station. As it turned out, this woman was not his first kill, but his third – the other two had been written off as normal overdoses because he had been able to convince them to inject themselves, telling them that it was a drug that would make for a good time. The vase was valuable enough to have caught his attention, but he took it not to sell, but to keep it as a souvenir.

Of course, Sherlock would have solved the murder himself if he had been given a few more moments. He could have easily worked out that the man was still downstairs. At least, that's what he told John, when they got back to the werewolf's bedsit.

He chose not to say aloud that John had been quite a big help.


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a million thank yous to the lovely Becca for being a great help with this chapter (and, once again, if you have not checked out her fic, Deducing Daisies, you are missing out). And thank you, all of you, for the support you've been giving me.

When the next full moon came around, a part of John expected Sherlock to request – or demand, more likely – that they spend it together. They had spent almost every day together for the past few days, after John had insisted that Sherlock not shut him out while he worked on the investigation. On top of that, Sherlock still seemed interested in him from a scientific standpoint – if he was not focussing all of his attention onto his research, he was asking questions or making deductions, or occasionally just going through John's drawers.

(The latter part, John knew, might have had nothing to do with John's biology and everything to do with the fact that Sherlock was the nosiest person on the planet, but he figured it still suggested some sort of interest in who John was.)

However, when Sherlock did not mention the full moon or John's upcoming transition, and it came to the day of the full moon, John decided that it was a good idea to bring it up. They were in Sherlock's flat at the time – John had arrived that morning to find Sherlock hunched over a document. This was becoming an increasingly common sight to see.

"Anything interesting?" he asked, walking over to lean over Sherlock's shoulder.

"Ballistics report," the vampire responded, "from the bullet we found in the forest. Mycroft gave it to me this morning."

John did not ask what was in the report or prompt Sherlock to continue, because if he had worked anything out about the vampire, it was that he was a show-off and he would end up describing what the report contained whether John asked him to or not. He was not disappointed.

"You won't be surprised to know that the bullet appears to have been fired from a rather rare type of gun," he said, pulling out a diagram of the gun in question. It looked fairly ordinary, at a glance, but ordinary guns do not fire wooden bullets. "Only a few of these guns have been manufactured worldwide, and Mycroft has sent me a list of manufacturers and any information he could collect on the individuals who purchased these guns. I believe it is safe to assume that this sort of gun would have mostly been purchased by hunters, and I should be able to follow the information straight to them so that I can work out if the hunter is a member of our organisation or not."

"I see," John murmured, studying the diagram for a moment longer before returning it to the pile of papers, and he glanced at the report. Using this information to determine precisely who bought the guns sounded like it would be a complicated task, especially because the hunters who purchased them would have likely done so illegally and would have attempted to cover their trails, but John supposed that if anyone could work it out, Sherlock could. The vampire had proven himself on multiple occasions, after all.

When Sherlock fell silent again for a couple of minutes, John brought up the topic of conversation that had been on his mind from the start. "It's the full moon tonight."

Sherlock did not even glance at him. "Yes, it is."

John was silent for a moment, waiting to see if Sherlock said anything more, and when he did not, the werewolf asked, "Do you – I mean, are you going to come with me? To the forest, I mean."

"I wasn't planning on it, no. It isn't as though you require my presence to help you shift, especially with the moon controlling it."

"Oh," John said, and his tone must have sounded disappointed, because Sherlock did actually look up at him at that point.

"Did you want me to?"

"No," said John, and then, "Sort of. Maybe. I don't know. I just sort of... Well, you were with me the last time I shifted. The last couple of times, technically, though I don't think the thing with the hunter counts. And the whole reason we stopped talking in the first place was because you were so determined to see me during the full moon that you had come to your brother's place, so I kind of assumed that now you're actually allowed to come with me you would want to."

"I'm allowed to?" Sherlock asked absently, turning his attention back to the files. "I might take you up on that offer. Not this time, however. I have this report to focus on."

John ignored the feeling in his stomach – it was not as though he needed Sherlock there, not at all – and he nodded his head. "All right. Is there anything I can do? It's not like I'll need to leave for another few hours."

Sherlock handed him a sheet of paper, and pointed to the map on the wall. "These are the names I've found who are in some way associated with the manufacturer of the guns. Use the database open on my laptop to work out where they live, and pin it."

OoO

They spent several hours at work, going through files and databases to find as many details on each of the individuals as possible. It was not an entertaining task, not in the slightest, and Sherlock was fairly certain that John fell asleep at one point, until Sherlock kicked the table leg and made the entire thing jolt. Still, they made a decent amount of progress in those few hours. By the time John left that afternoon to head to the forest (Sherlock did offer Mycroft's basement once again, but the werewolf decided that such a confined space was not necessary, especially now that he was beginning to control himself), the map on the wall contained several more pins, and Sherlock was beginning to work out which of those pins was relevant and which marked individuals who had purchased a gun but was not part of this organisation.

Still, however, there was a problem. No matter which way Sherlock looked at it, there was a missing link –  _the_  link. He could identify the individuals who had purchased the gun, and he knew (to some extent, anyway) which of these individuals were associated with one another and, consequently, the organisation and which were not. What he could not tell, however, was who was pulling the strings. Someone had to have given the order to the manufacturer, or at least to the organisation's members so that they could go to the manufacturer, and yet no matter what way Sherlock followed the trail, he could not work out who it was.

He rested his elbows on the desk, pressing his fingers to his lips and frowning at the pages in front of him. Every trail seemed to lead to yet another dead end; he had been here all day and he could likely be there all night doing the same thing, with no success. He was wasting his time, and Sherlock did not have time to waste. There had to be another way to do this, a better way than staring at files and waiting for the answer to become clear.

He pulled his laptop towards him, closing the database and opening one of his spare email accounts. He moved around the papers in front of him until he found the one containing the details that he had found on the manufacturer for the guns, and he typed in the email address.

If following these trails was proving unsuccessful, perhaps he had to make his own.

OoO

When John woke the next morning, his face was pressed into the dirt of the forest ground. The early morning sunlight streamed through the gaps between the leaves, breaking up the darkness of the night now past. He shifted, wincing as his muscles protested, and he managed to get himself up into a sitting position. He blinked blearily and looked around, taking in where he was.

His body was no more bloodied or injured than it had been in the past, and there was no taste of blood or animal fur in his mouth. There was no indication that he had caused anyone harm, be them human or animal, and he had not seemed to hurt himself either.

However, he could not remember any of it.

He rubbed his eyes and stayed where he was for a moment, hoping the memory would come back to him. He could remember shifting – or, at least, starting to shift – but following that, his mind seemed empty. He could not remember wandering through the forest or coming across any living creatures. He could not remember how he had gotten from Point A (where he had decided to shift) and Point B (here), and he could not remember anything that he had done in between.

He had memories of the hunter and of saving Sherlock's life. He had memories of chasing Sherlock through the forest. Yet he had no memories of the night that had just come to an end.

He sighed, forcing himself carefully to his feet. This did not prove anything. Perhaps it was harder when his change was controlled by the full moon as opposed to by himself. He could try again later, and prove to himself that he was not going backwards. It would be fine. It would all be fine.

He wrapped his arms around himself, and went to look for his clothes.

OoO

When John arrived back at his bedsit, later than he usually would have, he found Sherlock sitting at his desk.

The fact that the sight did not surprise him was probably a sign that he had spent far too much time with the vampire.

"Who let you in?" he asked, in the same tone of voice as one might use when asking a friend how their day has been.

"I did," Sherlock replied, otherwise not moving from his position, hunched over the desk. "You should be concerned about the security of this place. It took me a matter of minutes to pick the locks."

"Right," said John, taking out a mug and a teabag. "And why did you decide it was a good idea to pick the locks?"

"You weren't answering your door," Sherlock replied, as if that were obvious.

"Well, yes, but that was because I wasn't home."

"You should have been home. And I wasn't to know that you were not, in fact, inside and simply refusing to answer, for whatever reason."

"Can't you smell me or something?"

"Your entire building smells like you. It's an easy enough mistake to make."

John sighed, but then he turned his attention back to the kettle as he put it on the stove. "Maybe next time wait until I'm home," he said, but it was clear in his tone that he was not as bothered as he should have been about Sherlock breaking into his flat.

"You should be grateful I broke in, anyway," Sherlock said after a moment, drawing John's attention away from the kettle and back to him. "Look what I found in your kitchen."

John frowned, and walked over, looking over Sherlock's shoulder. Whatever Sherlock had found had been taken apart, individual pieces scattered over John's desk, and it took John a moment to realise what it was. When he did, however, his eyes widened, and his hand fell to the back of the chair on which Sherlock sat, clenching it tightly. "Is that a camera?"

"Yes," Sherlock replied with a nod of his head. He gestured up to one of the top shelves in the kitchen area – one that John did not have a clear view of, given his height. "I found it up there, and it looks like it's been sitting there for several months. I only noticed it when I got in because it seems the battery is running flat, and it started making noises. Very quiet noises, of course – a human would not have heard them."

John rubbed his eyes, squeezing them shut tightly. "Jesus Christ. Someone has been spying on me?"

"It's more likely that they've been spying on me. This was not put in until after we met, and presuming that no one knew about your biology when they put the camera in – which is unlikely, given the only locations in which you have changed have been an empty forest and a secure basement – you're not the sort of person that people would choose to spy on. I am."

"Because that's not arrogant at all," said John, not in the slightest bit reassured.

"I'm a vampire and a consulting detective. I have enemies."

John chose not to comment on the fact that, in real life, people do not have enemies. "If you're the one being spied on, why the hell is it in my flat?"

"Because whoever is spying on us is clever. They know that they cannot put a camera in my flat without me noticing, and they know that I spend enough time with you for your flat to be the next best thing. It might even explain how the hunter knew that I was onto him. I think it is safe to assume that whoever put this camera in is a part of this organisation, and we have been watched by someone high up, maybe even at the top."

John looked around, gaze wandering up over the walls. "Are you sure there isn't another camera around? Maybe we should keep quiet."

Sherlock shook his head. "Don't worry; I took the liberty of searching the entire place. It's clean. However, I think how easily I got in here, and how easily whoever inserted the camera got in here, should be enough proof that we should keep any new research we do out of your flat from now on. Just to be on the safe side."

"Pretty sure I want to keep myself out of here from now on. Christ, how am I supposed to sleep knowing that people can break in?"

"I doubt you would sleep through it. I imagine whoever put this camera in did so while you were out. Perhaps on the night of the full moon."

John stared down at the parts of the camera on the desk. "They know I'm a werewolf now, don't they?"

Sherlock nodded once. "It's not a certainty, but given they would have had enough time to notice your regular absence one night a month, it seems likely. Shame, it would have helped to have the element of surprise. You could have been our secret weapon."

"Right. Because that's the biggest problem here."

Sherlock looked over at him, raising his eyebrows. "The hunter's organisation affects more than just you and me, John. Of course it's the biggest problem here. You look terrible, by the way. Bad night, I take it?"

John looked around again. He had no way of being certain whether or not he was imagining the prickling sensation on the back of his neck. "Look, I'm going to go wash up, and then can we go back to your place? I know you've taken the camera down, but I'd rather go somewhere where I don't feel like I'm being watched."


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, many thank yous to the lovely Becca for being amazing and helping me out with editing. And thank you to everyone who has commented - you guys make me grin like a fool at my laptop.

John took a quick shower, just long enough to get the dirt out of his skin and his hair, and he got changed in the bathroom before stepping out again. His gaze moved first to the desk where he had left Sherlock, where the pieces of the camera still lay, but the vampire was not there. John did not have time to wonder where he had disappeared to, however, because his attention was almost immediately drawn to his small wardrobe, where he could see Sherlock hunched over, picking up articles of clothing and then tossing them carelessly over his shoulder.

John wasn't sure if he was more confused or annoyed.

"Uh, what are you doing?"

"Looking for something for you to wear."

All right, John was certainly more confused. He walked over, standing behind the vampire and immediately regretting this position as a t-shirt hit him square in the face. He caught it before it slid off and to the floor, and then he looked down at the pile of clothing at his feet. "Stop it, you're making a mess and I know you're not going to clean it up for me," he said, relieved to find that Sherlock did actually stop – although it was not clear whether that was because he was listening to what John had said or because he had decided that the shirt he had just pulled out of the wardrobe was not worth throwing over his shoulder.

John continued, "Now, are you going to explain  _why_  you're looking for something for me to wear? I'm dressed, in case you haven't noticed."

Sherlock glanced over his shoulder, looking John up and down before meeting his eyes. "Oh, that's right, I didn't tell you. I set up a meeting with the gun manufacturer."

"People have meetings with gun manufacturers rather than just going in there and buying a gun?"

"This is a very particular sort of gun, John. It's designed to kill a creature that is not supposed to exist – the manufacturer won't give it to just anyone. He likes to have meetings with the people he sells them to, to find out whom they are and what they plan on doing with the guns."

"Right. So, why are you finding me something to wear? I'm fairly certain you don't need me to tag along."

"You're not tagging along. You're going alone."

"Excuse me?"

Sherlock pulled out a tie, frowning at it for a moment before putting it away and continuing to search alone. "You'll be going to the meeting, under the pretence of being vampire hunter Jackson Howells, interested in purchasing this gun. You'll be able to have a conversation with him, and if you can steer it in any way to his contacts to gain any information, that would be useful. For the most part, however, you're serving as a distraction. The manufacturer keeps all of his files in hard copy rather than online, for obvious reasons. In his office should be all the information about who he sells to and who he is in contact with. If you can distract him, I can get in and collect the information about his contacts, and we might be able to work out how he is tied to the man in the centre of this organisation."

"Okay, great, rewind to the part where you're expecting me to go in there and pretend to buy a vampire hunter's gun. Are you crazy? Why don't you just go in there - you're a better actor than I am. I'll do the file searching."

Sherlock shook his head. "No, I don't trust you to find the information I need." John gave him a look, but he continued with a dismissive hand gesture, "Oh, don't be like that – I wouldn't trust anyone. Besides, you're far more suited to the role."

"Oh, right, I forgot I look the part of a vampire hunter," John muttered, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"In a sense. You're a military man. The way you hold yourself, the way you speak – it all portrays that. You can exaggerate it a bit to make it more obvious when you meet with him, of course, but I'm sure that won't be difficult for you. So, your military history suggests a certain level of comfort with guns and with a very particular sort of target, and it would not be hard for you to make him believe that you had moved onto hunting vampires after you left the army. Plus, of course, you'll be able to discuss weaponry in more detail, given your knowledge, so that will make it more believable."

John rubbed his eyes, pressing the heels of his palms against them and groaning. "What have I gotten myself into?" he muttered, and then sighed, looking up again. "All right. Why do I need to change my clothes?"

"Look at you," – Sherlock gestured to all of John – "you look harmless. I can't have you walking in there looking as though you're more suited to domestic bliss than to a hunter's lifestyle." He turned back to the wardrobe, and after a moment, he stood, turning around and handing John a button-down shirt, trousers, and a jacket that he was fairly certain he had never worn. "Put these on."

John was tempted to refuse, but he figured it would only lead to an argument, and really, he could not be bothered. So, he sighed and took the pile of clothing, disappearing into the bathroom and emerging a few moments later in the clothes that Sherlock had picked out for him. They fit him, of course, given they were his clothes, but he couldn't help but feel uncomfortable, dressing in something that he would not have chosen unless he were about to go to an important meeting (which he was, really, but that was not his choice).

When he stepped out, Sherlock gave him a once over, and then his gaze lingered on the werewolf's throat. John wondered – or, more correctly, worried about – what he was thinking, before the vampire spoke.

"Where are your dog tags?"

John blinked. "Box under my bed," he said without thinking, and then, as Sherlock turned to get to it, he took a quick step forward and put his hand out to stop him. "Woah, hold on, I'll get them."

Sherlock gave him a curious look, similar to the look that he gave to suspects in cases, as if he could see straight through them and through whatever they were saying. Thankfully, however, he did step back, and John bit back a sigh of relief as he moved over to the bed.

He lowered himself to his knees, compensating out of habit for a pain in his leg that he no longer felt, and he pulled out the box that was under his bed. He angled his body in a way that blocked the box from Sherlock's view, but the vampire was entirely capable of leaning over and peering over his shoulder, so John only opened up the box's lid as much as necessary. He reached in, ignoring the photographs and letters and other things that held memories of a time that seemed more like another life, and his fingers closed around the cool, silver chain. He pulled it out, closing the box's lid as soon as he had and pushing it back underneath his bed.

He stood carefully, silver tags hanging from his fingertips, and he turned to face Sherlock again. The vampire's bright eyes were fixated on the tags, following them back and forth as if he were being hypnotised by them. John cleared his throat to make sure he had the vampire's attention before he spoke.

"You know these have my name on them, right? I don't magically have a pair that read Jack Howells."

"Jackson," Sherlock corrected. "And that's not important; the tags themselves will be hidden beneath your shirt, and it isn't as though Mr O'Donnell will be looking closely enough to read the name on them anyway. As long as enough of the chain is visible for him to see that you are, in fact, wearing dog tags, that will help with your image. Put them on, let me see."

John sighed, but he did as he was asked, putting the chain around his neck and letting the tags fall beneath the collar of his shirt. Sherlock examined him for a moment (examined felt like the correct word, because the way that Sherlock looked at him seemed almost clinical) before saying "Keep the top button undone, otherwise the chain won't be visible." After John fixed up his shirt, then, the vampire nodded. "Better. Now, come on, or you'll be late."

"Couldn't you have asked me before you booked this meeting?" John said, already following Sherlock towards the door. "I'm tired, I would have much rather done this after a proper night's sleep."

"You were out, how could I have asked you? Besides, it's better to get this done sooner rather than later, so we have the information that we need and we can continued with the investigation. Now, hurry up, before we waste any more time."

OoO

"All right," said John as the cab drew closer to its destination. He was talking in a low voice so that the cab driver couldn't hear, but it was apparent that the driver was paying little attention to them anyway. "My name is Jackson Howells. Where did that name even come from, anyway? I look nothing like a Jackson." He shook his head quickly at Sherlock's look. "Right, not important. I was a soldier in – Afghanistan?"

Sherlock nodded. "That will be easier for you to remember."

"Right. I was a soldier in Afghanistan. Was I sent home because of an injury?"

"No, you just finished your time. No need to bring an injury into this – it only adds more questions. Keep it simple, so that there is as little as possible for O'Donnell to answer you about. I don't trust your ability to think on your feet."

"Then why are you getting me to do this?"

"You know why. We've been through this. Now, keep going over it – it will all be easier for you to bring to mind if it's fresh in your memory."

John sighed, glancing out the window in an attempt to get some idea of where they were and how close the shop was before he turned back to Sherlock. "Okay. So, I left Afghanistan, and – became a vampire hunter."

Sherlock sighed, steepling his fingers against his lips. "You really are terrible at this. You don't need to give more information, John – lies always involve more information, so simple his best. You do, however, need to not sound so uncertain about all of it."

"Of course I'm going to sound uncertain about it. You've given me an hour to learn a whole new identity. Besides, it's not my fault that I can't see a leap between being a soldier in Afghanistan and hunting vampires."

Sherlock thought for a moment. "You became aware of their existence while you were in Afghanistan. Perhaps you lost someone to a vampire attack while you were there and decided to study them, to understand how to beat them." He paused for a moment. "You don't need to tell O'Donnell that, of course – keep it simple. That just gives you something to think about in your own head so you don't sound so uncertain."

John sighed. "This is ridiculous. This is such a bad idea, you know."

"Oh, relax. Just go into his office, convince him that you're looking to purchase this sort of gun, and then get him out of his office so that I can get in there and get the information we need. It's not a hard job."

"Yeah, it could only cost us both our lives if he sees through it. What if he knows who I am, or what I am? I mean, there was a bloody camera in my room – what if he knows something?"

"It's not likely that the footage from the camera would have gone beyond the few people high enough in the organisation, and I find it highly unlikely that it would have been given to a weapons manufacturer." He glanced out the window, and then raised his voice so that the cab driver could hear him. "Just here is fine."

The cab slowed to a stop, and Sherlock paid the driver and climbed out before turning to John. "The shop is just around the corner. Best you go alone now so that we aren't seen together. Act confident, John. If you walk in the way that you look now you'll never pass as a hunter."

Sherlock's tone of voice was not at all reassuring; instead, he sounded as though he was ordering the werewolf around. It made John want to refuse, but, once again, he didn't, for the sake of avoiding an argument.

_Get in, let Sherlock get the information, get out. Then tea._

The sooner he got through this, the better.


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thank you so much to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for proofreading this for me. 
> 
> Now, I'm going back to uni this week and we have just about caught up with the chapters I have already written. I'll do my best to keep posting every week, but if I get too busy posting may become a bit more sporadic, so I apologise in advance if that is the case.

The man that John presumed to be O'Donnell was engaged in conversation with a customer when John stepped through the door of the shop. John stared at him for a few seconds before he realised that he was doing so, and he quickly turned his attention instead to one of the guns on the wall, examining it. He kept his shoulders back, and he folded his hands behind his back without thinking about it, standing in parade rest. He kept his head up high and did his best to look calm and collected, and not like he was standing awkwardly as he waited for the man to finish.

_Stay in character_ , he could hear Sherlock's voice saying in his head. _You're a hunter. You need to look calm, and not overly friendly. Don't be yourself._

John walked slowly through the room, stopping in front of some of the guns and taking them in as if they had interested him. He did not look over his shoulder at any point to see if the man was finished with his customer, but he did stay at least slightly aware of the conversation that was going on behind him, so he knew when it had stopped. He heard the door click shut as the customer left the shop, but John pretended to not have noticed, too engaged in what he was doing. He heard footsteps coming up behind him, and he did not turn until the man spoke.

"Can I help you?"

_Stay calm, stay in character._

John turned towards him, keeping himself from smiling in greeting like he would normally, but he did his best to not look hostile at the same time. "Mr O'Donnell, I presume," he said, and only then did he realise that he should have asked Sherlock to see the emails before he had come here. If they had discussed anything, John wouldn't know it – he would not be able to make references to the emails or understand anything Mr O'Donnell said on that matter, and that could be problematic.

He kept himself calm, however, and decided that he could do this as long as anything he said was vague. There was no need to go into specifics. He continued, "My name is Jackson Howells; I believe we had a meeting."

"Ah, Mr Howells, of course. Funny, I imagined you would be taller."

John blinked, and the man cracked a smile that did not seem all that friendly, nor amused.

"Come on, this way," he said, leading John through the shop and through a door by the counter, into his office. The werewolf looked around as he stepped inside, taking in the pictures of guns on the walls, the photograph on the desk, and a planner sitting on the centre. John did not get to take a proper look at it before O'Donnell put it away, but it was long enough for him to tell what that notebook contained. As he slid into the seat in front of the desk, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and sent off a text under the table before pocketing it again.

Top drawer.

"So, Mr Howells," said O'Donnell as he took a seat across from John, drawing John's attention back to him. "I'm aware that you're looking for a very particular sort of gun. Tell me, what made you aware that you could find it here?"

_Think fast._

John leaned back on his chair to take on a more relaxed pose and shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, you know. I have my contacts, like I'm sure you have yours."

"Is that so?" O'Donnell asked, leaning forward on the desk. "I don't suppose our contacts would overlap, would they?"

"I'm certain they would, as I know of people who you've sold guns to. I'm sure you don't need me to give names."

"I'd rather you do, actually. I like to know who my customers are working with."

John tried to keep the panic off his face, raising his eyebrows. "Why?"

O'Donnell smiled in a way that was, once again, not friendly. "Hunting is a dangerous business. So is supplying to hunters. I like to know exactly who I'm dealing with."

There was a list in Sherlock's flat of the members of this organisation. John had seen it. He hadn't spent a great deal of time studying it, memorising the details on it, but he had seen it. Somewhere in his memory there had to be those names. Surely, if he could just remember one of them, he could convince the hunter that he was who he said he was.

The hunter was giving him a look that was very clearly suspicious. He leaned his forearms on the desk, leaning forward, and John spat the first name that he could remember.

"Moran."

The man raised his eyebrows, not looking entirely convinced. "Is that so?" he said, and John fought to keep his expression neutral as he nodded his head.

_Can't change your answer now. Just go with it._

"He did get his gun from you, didn't he? Or have I come to the wrong place?"

"Oh, he definitely got his gun from me," O'Donnell said. "I just didn't think that Moran was the type to swap stories and advice on where to get the best weaponry."

John clenched his hands underneath the table, as though bracing himself for his next sentence. There were two ways this could go. To say what he was about to say was a risk, but his options were limited. He had already tripped up, and now he had to fix up the mess he had made before he got kicked out of the office and ruined Sherlock's chances of gathering the information he needed.

"Well," John said, "it's not like we sat down for a nice cuppa and discussed hunting techniques. He approached me, offered me a job. It's not like he could have done that without telling me how to do it."

O'Donnell leaned back in his seat, and John could not describe the wave of relief that rushed over him.

"Ah," said O'Donnell. "You're one of that lot. Wouldn't have pegged you for it."

John was fairly certain that 'that lot' referred to the organisation, but he chose not to say anything about it just in case he was wrong. He made a mental note to talk to Sherlock the moment that this was over – apparently, the idea of this Moran hiring people was not an impossible one, and maybe that meant that Moran was a little higher up in this organisation than the rest of the people on that list.

O'Donnell continued, "Have you ever killed a vampire, Howell?"

John decided that to lie on this one was too big of a risk. "No. Not yet, anyway. I don't exactly have a gun with wooden bullets lying around yet."

"And so why would Moran have approached you?"

John, thankfully, had predicted this question, and the answer came easily. "I'm a good shot. I was in the army, and I rarely miss. One of the guys I shot was a vampire – but, you know how they heal. It's pretty terrifying to watch, when you don't know until that point that vampires exist."

O'Donnell seemed pleased with the response, much to John's relief, because he nodded his head and then stood up. "Well then, let's get you to have a look at one of these guns, and we'll see how good a shot you really are."

John stood, following the manufacturer out of the office and shutting the door behind him – but not enough for the lock to click.

OoO

From across the street, Sherlock could see through the window of the store as John and O'Donnell stepped out of the office and into the main room of the shop. The window only gave Sherlock a limited view of the store's interior, so he gave John a few minutes to get the manufacturer out of the way before he entered the store. He opened the door only enough for him to just squeeze through, to make as little sound as possible, and then looked around.

The room was empty, and Sherlock took a few seconds to look around to confirm this, before the sound of gunfire did so. The store was attached to a shooting range, and that would be where John and O'Donnell were. It didn't give him long – once O'Donnell had seen that John could shoot, the two would be back in there, moving to the cash register to complete the sale. So, Sherlock had to make every second count.

Moving quickly and quietly, Sherlock headed to the door to the office, giving it a push and smiling when it opened. John had managed to keep it from locking automatically. Good. He stepped inside and closed it carefully behind him in the same way, before moving over to the desk.

It would not have taken him long to find the book, but John's text had helped a lot. He opened up the top drawer of the desk, and then pulled out the book, putting it down on the desk and opening it up. He pulled his phone from his pocket, holding it above the open book and snapping a photograph, before turning the page and repeating the process.

There was another gunshot in the other room, and Sherlock snapped a couple more pictures of the pages before closing the book and returning it to the drawer.

There was no time to go through the pictures now, but there would be plenty of time for that later. Right now, the priority was to get out of the office before O'Donnell got back to it. He closed the drawer and gave the room a quick once-over to make sure that nothing was out of place, before heading to the door. He reached for the door handle, fingers closing around it, and then he froze.

There was another voice outside the room – another person in the store – and it seemed that O'Donnell had come out to greet him.

Sherlock pressed his ear against the door, just in time to hear the end of a sentence from a voice that was neither John's nor O'Donnell's, saying that he had a delivery. He heard O'Donnell begin to respond, and he could hear John's voice, interrupting him, telling him to come back down to the shooting range. He knew that Sherlock was still in the office, and was trying to give Sherlock a chance to get out.

Unfortunately, O'Donnell was not interested in leaving a potential paying customer right away. "I'll be back with you in just a moment, Mr Howell," Sherlock heard him say. "Let me just put this in-"

Sherlock did not need to hear the end of that sentence to know where O'Donnell was heading. If the vampire had a beating heart, this would have been the moment where it started to race, pounding loudly in his ears. He turned, scanning around the room and he made a leap for the desk in a second, curling himself up underneath it. There wasn't enough room for his long legs, however, and so although the desk blocked Sherlock from view from the doorway, the moment O'Donnell walked even a little way into the room, he would be seen.

He couldn't hear exactly what O'Donnell and John were saying outside, but he could hear the tone of voice that was being used by John – his words seemed hurried, frantic, and Sherlock could imagine what he was saying, trying to do anything in his power to stop O'Donnell from opening up that door. It was not working, however, and O'Donnell was raising his voice – perhaps he was becoming suspicious, perhaps he was simply becoming annoyed. It did not matter which – either way, Sherlock could hear the handle turning, the door sliding across the floor.

There was no other way out. In approximately six seconds, O'Donnell would have covered the two steps it would take to get close enough to the desk to see Sherlock, and the vampire would be caught. His only option was to use force – if he was fast enough, he could knock O'Donnell down and flee without the dealer having the opportunity to get a good look at him. He shifted positions without raising his head above the top of the desk, preparing to move and-

Outside the office was a deafening gunshot.

The sound was enough to make Sherlock flinch, and he squeezed his eyes shut instinctively. He did not need to have a working heart for it to feel as though it had leapt into his throat. For a split second, there was silence, and in that split second Sherlock's mind had run through several different case scenarios. Did John shoot O'Donnell? Did O'Donnell shoot John? Did an unexpected, third individual come in and fire a gun? Was John hurt? Was John hurt? Was John-

"What the bloody Hell was that?"

That was O'Donnell's voice, and Sherlock chanced a glance around the side of the desk, peering through the open door of the office. He could see O'Donnell, back facing the office, and he could not see John, not until he leaned a little further around the desk to see through a different angle. John was standing (thank God thank God) and staring at the gun in his hand as if he had never seen it before in his life.

"I-I don't know what happened!" he exclaimed, holding the gun away from his body. "I didn't mean to..."

"You said you were a soldier!" O'Donnell exclaimed, storming towards John. "Surely you know a little bit of gun safety!"

His back was turned and his attention was far more focussed on John, so Sherlock used the opportunity to escape from the room.

OoO

It took John a further ten minutes to come and join Sherlock around the corner of the building, where the vampire was waiting for him. He gave John a quick once over, noting the lack of gun in his hands. John shrugged his shoulders.

"He decided that someone who could not demonstrate gun safety in a store was probably not fit to be a hunter, and he refused to sell it to me," he said in a tone of voice that did not sound all that disappointed. "Whoops."

Sherlock couldn't help but let a faint smile pull across his lips. "You surprised me," he confessed.

"Didn't exactly have a chance to warn you. It seemed like the only way I was going to get him from going into his office."

"No, I wasn't referring to the gunshot itself, although that did surprise me. Your ability to think on your feet, and your acting. You're certainly not fantastic by any definition, but it was... not terrible."

John raised his eyebrows, and then grinned. "You know, it wouldn't hurt you to compliment someone once in a while. Tell me you got what you needed."

Sherlock patted his pocket where he could feel his phone. "Yes, although I've not yet had the chance to look at it and confirm that there is anything in there of relevance."

John looked around, and then held up a hand in an attempt to get the attention of a cab driver. "Well then, we better head home and do just that."


	30. Chapter 30

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I owe you all an apology for how long it's taken me to get this chapter up. Uni can be exhausting, and then combine that with the fact that I was choreographing for a concert immediately after my exams, and the fact that my laptop conveniently decided to need repairing right before my exams - it's been a hectic few months. But, I'm on holidays now, and I've made sure to write another couple of chapters after this one so I shouldn't need to disappear again for at least a few weeks. Thank you so much to all of you who have stuck around, and a special thank you to anyone who has left a comment or kudos on this story. I hope this chapter makes up for the wait!

There was no need to discuss whose 'home' they were going back to. Sherlock's flat was the one that they spent the most time at, and John's tiny bedsit hardly fit the criteria for a home kept their heads turned away from the window as the cab passed the store, even though it was unlikely that anyone would pay enough attention to one of the many cabs in London to see who the passengers were, and they only relaxed once the building was out of sight. They did not talk for the entire trip home, not for lack of things to say, but because Sherlock's attention was far more focussed on his phone.

The moment they returned to Baker Street, Sherlock headed straight for his desk. He opened up his laptop, plugged in his phone to transfer the images over, and then he printed them out so that they were bigger and easier to view. John followed him into the living room, and he lingered there awkwardly for a few seconds before deciding that he might as well make use of the food and drinks that Sherlock's landlady continued to buy for the flat. He walked into the kitchen, putting the kettle on the stove and pulling out a teabag and the same mug that he had been using over the past several weeks, like clockwork.

"Do you need anything to drink?" he asked over the sound of the kettle, and then he repeated the question twice before Sherlock seemed to actually notice that he was talking.

"What? Oh. No, I fed recently."

"Recently by whose definition?"

Sherlock gave him a faintly amused look. "Recently by any definition. I assure you, I'm fine."

John did not feel all that assured, but he chose not to argue. He turned his attention back to the kettle, waiting for it to finish boiling before he made himself a tea. He carried the mug over when he was done and took a seat across from Sherlock, who was in the process of going through the photos that he had printed.

"Anything I can do?" John asked, putting his mug off to the side. Sherlock reached for a paper in his ever-growing pile without looking up, and handed it over.

OoO

They spent the better part of an hour going through the pages, comparing the information in O'Donnell's planner to the information that Mycroft had given Sherlock with the ballistics report. It filled in some of the gaps, showing links between people that Sherlock had not noticed before and even adding some new names to the list, but yet, the one piece of information that Sherlock had hoped to get from it was missing. O'Donnell was clearly in contact with either the person at the top of the organisation, or someone high up at least – he received orders for guns from this individual, and he then distributed these guns to the organisation's members – but he did not keep any information on the head of the organisation that Sherlock could use. In his planner, O'Donnell only ever referred to the individual as 'M'.

John rested his elbows on the table and put his head in his hands, rubbing his eyes. "I don't think we're going to learn anything new if we just keep staring at these pictures, Sherlock," he said, looking up at the vampire (who was doing just that). "Whoever 'M' is, they're good at covering their tracks. It's not like anyone in this organisation is just going to write down their name and contact details in a way that's easy for us to follow."

Sherlock looked up, staring at John, and his eyes grew bright. "No, they're not," he said. "But that doesn't mean that they don't have that information inside of their heads."

John frowned. "Right. And that's any good to us because you're a mind-reader now?"

"Don't be idiotic. We're wasting our time trying to find physical information. What we need to do is find one of these members, and get the information from them directly."

"And how do you plan on doing that?"

Sherlock glanced down at the pictures once again, shuffling through until he found the page he was looking for, and he grinned, turning the picture so that John could take a look.

"What?" John asked, and Sherlock pointed to the name written next to the following day's date.

'Winther', it read, a name that meant little to John except that he had seen it before.

"He's... one of the organisation, isn't he? One of the names on Mycroft's list?"

"She," Sherlock corrected. "Katerina Winther. Seems she has a meeting with Mr O'Donnell late tomorrow night. I think we should pay her a visit, don't you?"

OoO

The following afternoon, after John finished work, he went to Baker Street. He made one stop first, at his own flat, where he took the gun that was hidden in his desk drawer and hid it against his back, beneath his jumper. Despite the fact that he had slept poorly the night before (Sherlock had assured him that he had checked John's bedsit for any more cameras like the one he had found in the kitchen, but John could not quite shake off the feeling that night that he was being watched), he was feeling surprisingly alert. There were so many possible ways that tonight could end, and John felt as though he was prepared for any of them.

There was a black car parked outside Sherlock's flat when John's cab pulled up. He climbed out after paying the driver and walked past the car a little closer than he needed to, but he couldn't see through the tinted windows to tell if there was anyone inside. He made his way up the front steps, finding the door already ajar, so he pushed it open and made his way upstairs. He was surprised to find that he couldn't hear the sound of voices on his way up; instead, he could hear music, a familiar piece that he couldn't quite put a name to flowing through the building.

He reached the top of the stairs, but lingered at the open doorway to the living room. Sherlock was facing the window, back to John, and for a moment or two, the werewolf couldn't help but be enchanted by the sound coming from the strings as Sherlock stroked the bow over them. He had never heard Sherlock play before; the only time he had even seen Sherlock's violin was the first time he had come to Baker Street, and then Sherlock had been plucking at the strings absently rather than actually playing.

The melody rose and fell, and John didn't want to speak, or even breathe, in case it drew Sherlock's attention away from the music before it came to its natural close. He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the doorframe, watching the bow move over the strings in combinations of quick movements and long strokes. The sound built in volume and in complexity, the bow moving quickly over the strings, and then ended at last with a single, drawn out note that seemed to fill the room even when the sound finally stopped.

"That's pretty," John said. Sherlock glanced over his shoulder as he put the instrument away; he seemed unsurprised that John was there.

"Helps me to think."

John pushed himself away from the doorframe and stepped into the room, looking around. "I expected to see your brother here."

"Why?" Sherlock asked, and then answered himself, "Oh, the car out the front. No, that's not his. Well, it is his, but it wasn't used to bring him here. It's for us."

"What do we need a car for?"

"To take us to the gun store."

"We're not taking a cab?"

Sherlock gave him a look. "We know from O'Donnell's planner what time Winther is meeting O'Donnell. What we don't know is how long their meeting should take. We can hardly ask a cab driver to simply wait by the side of the road and then request he follow a woman home. Besides, it brings an extra person into the whole situation, which is just another risk factor. Really, John, that should be obvious."

John crossed his arms over his chest. "It would be obvious if I knew what our plan was. It isn't as though you've told me anything."

"The plan isn't complicated. We wait outside for Winther's meeting to finish, we follow her home, and we confront her."

"So a stakeout, then?"

"More or less."

John moved into the kitchen, pulling out a mug and a teabag for himself, and a second mug for Sherlock. "So what's confronting her going to involve, then?"

"We'll have to catch her off-guard, obviously. If she has been bitten, she may want to stay loyal to her employer, but everyone has their limits."

John hesitated for a moment, teabag dangling from his hands above his mug, and he glanced over his shoulder at Sherlock. The vampire's tone of voice was neutral, virtually unreadable, but with the way that he was talking, John couldn't help but jump to conclusions. It sounded as though Sherlock was implying that they might need to torture the information out of her, if it came to that.

"Are we going to kill her?" John asked quietly.

"Not if we don't have to," Sherlock replied. "Obviously, the issue with hunters is that they so rarely give us a choice. We couldn't have reasoned with the hunter in the forest. However, if we have other options, we can use them."

"What, like reasoning with her and convincing her that becoming a hunter is a poor life choice that she should reconsider?"

"Like arresting her."

"Excuse me?"

"Hunters may be focussed on killing a particular species, but they kill nonetheless. If we find evidence of that, it gives our dear Detective Inspector reason for an arrest. He doesn't need to know that the people the hunters had killed were not human."

John moved over to the fridge to find a blood bag for Sherlock and some milk for himself (presuming there was milk that did not smell toxic today). "Would that even work?" he asked.

"It wouldn't be the first time Lestrade has unknowingly arrested one. Sometimes there is no option but to ensure our own safety by... removing the risk the hunter poses entirely, but that doesn't mean that they can't be overpowered and locked up."

John hummed in acknowledgement, quiet for a moment. John had killed people before, many of whom he felt no guilt over, but he wasn't a cold-blooded killer. The idea of killing when there is an alternative – any alternative – was not an idea that pleased him. However, it felt almost strange to imagine the solution to their hunter problem involving arrests rather than deaths. It felt like the organisation was so much bigger than anything else, something that required a much more drastic solution than what Sherlock was explaining. Regardless, what Sherlock was explaining certainly did not sound bad.

He pulled out the bag of blood from the fridge, and Sherlock frowned at him. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Making something to drink."

"No, you're making me something to drink."

John had to pause at that simply to raise his eyebrows at Sherlock. "Brilliant deduction. However did you know?"

"I don't need blood."

"Sure you don't." John poured the water from the now-boiled kettle into his mug, and then grabbed a knife to cut open the plastic of the blood bag. Sherlock interrupted him before he could start.

"I don't need blood. What are you doing?"

"Look, Sherlock, we are about to go meet a hunter, and in case you don't remember, the last hunter you met almost turned you into an official corpse, rather than one that walks and talks." The knife sliced through the plastic, and he poured the contents into the mug, careful to breathe through his mouth as he did. The smell of blood brought back memories of the war, and the smell of blood coupled with the idea that it was about to go into Sherlock's mouth was almost sickening. "I don't care if you last fed a day ago or a week ago; you're feeding now and we're not leaving this flat until you have. Understood?"

"I don't need you to mother me."

"Sherlock." John put the mug in the microwave for a minute before turning around to face the vampire again, giving him a stubborn look that very clearly said that he was not backing down. Fortunately, Sherlock seemed to notice this as well; the stubborn look on the vampire's face faded after a moment of staring, and his shoulders sagged.

"Fine. But only because we both need our strength."

"Good lad," John said, and the microwave beeped behind him. He took the mug out and pushed it into Sherlock's hands, before picking up his own, blowing on the tea to help it cool. "Now drink up. God knows we're going to need all our strength for this."


	31. Chapter 31

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I completely forgot to thank my beta, Becca (also known as LlamaWithAPen) for last chapter! Many thanks to her help on both the previous chapter and this one, amongst others.

As it turned out, stakeouts were not nearly as interesting as the movies made them out to be.

It was dark by the time that the two of them had left the flat, but it was still early, relative to the time that Winthers was to have her meeting. This was intentional, of course, as Sherlock had insisted on arriving before Winthers turned up to avoid arousing suspicion. It was not late enough for the streets to be empty; Sherlock had parked in a short line of cars on the opposite side of the road, close enough to view the store without being too close. With the car turned off and the tinted windows hiding the fact that anyone was inside, their car looked like it was just parked there, no different from the rest.

John did not know what Winthers looked like – he spent a couple of minutes looking around at the people he saw walking through the streets before deciding that he had no idea what to look for, so he trusted that Sherlock would be able to identify her when she did, eventually, turn up. He was not disappointed; after ten minutes of absent people-watching, Sherlock grabbed his attention.

"That's her," he said, gesturing to a figure walking towards the store's door, and John sat up straight to get a better look. The sight made his stomach twist. Winthers couldn't be older than nineteen years.

"Christ, Sherlock, she's just a kid."

"Youth doesn't make one incapable of criminal acts," Sherlock replied. "Even children are capable of murder."

"Still," John murmured. "She can't be any older than a teenager. What could have happened to her that led her to this?"

Sherlock glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. "In this case, I don't think her motives are of any interest to us," he said, and John frowned at him, though he did not say anything else. It said volumes that a person's motives were of no interest to Sherlock if the motives did not directly relate to the case. Winthers was of no interest to Sherlock as a person, except for her association, whatever it may be, with the mysterious 'M' that was pulling all the strings.

John watched as the woman – girl, really – stepped up to the door, glancing over her shoulder before she pushed it open and stepped inside, disappearing from sight. Once she had, both of them sank back into their seats.

"And now we wait," John murmured.

OoO

And so they waited.

For almost an hour.

John did not know what Winthers and O'Donnell could be doing that dragged their meeting out for nearly an hour, but he was fairly certain that whatever it was could not be good. John's fake meeting had scarcely taken a fraction of this time, and so it was probably safe to assume that whatever Winthers was doing was not simply purchasing a gun. John found himself wishing that they had some way to hear what was going on inside, but even with their enhanced senses, they were too far away to even catch a word.

The amount of time that Winthers had been in the building so far also meant that it was getting very hard to stay focussed, or even to stay awake. They were sitting in one position, staring at a door and waiting for it to open; it was  _boring_.

John could tell that Sherlock was getting restless, as well. His fingers were tapping on the steering wheel, or on his thighs, unable to keep still. He had even taken to deducing information about the people who owned the cars parked near them, gesturing to mud splatters or the type and size of vehicle or the decorations that could be seen in the front window or hanging off the rear-view mirror. It provided a pleasant distraction from the boredom temporarily, John finding himself impressed once again regarding what Sherlock could tell from such tiny details, but there were only so many cars that were close enough to provide any useful information, and so it wasn't long before Sherlock had fallen silent again. He stared intently at the door as if he could telepathically tell Winthers to hurry up and come out so that he and John had something to do.

"What do you think she's doing in there?" John asked. "Surely if she just needed to pick up a new gun it wouldn't take nearly that long."

"Hopefully we'll find out soon enough," Sherlock replied. "I confess I did not anticipate such a long wait." He glanced over at John and asked, "When you went down to the shooting range, there were no other exits, correct?"

John shook his head. "None that I saw. She has to still be in there, unless we've somehow managed to miss her coming out."

"I don't miss anything," Sherlock said quickly, sounding almost affronted by the near-accusation, and John held up his hands in a defensive gesture.

"Right, then she's still inside."

They lapsed back into silence for a few minutes, John's gaze flickering over to where Sherlock's fingers had started tapping against his thigh again, and after a pause he asked, "Do you do this sort of thing often? Stakeouts?"

"Hm? Not usually. This is the Yard's work. If I get called into cases, it tends to be when the police are out of their depth – which is quite often, and generally means that they have no idea who to suspect. We can hardly have a stakeout if they don't know who it is that they should be watching."

John hummed. "So you just end up going to crime scenes and occasionally doing insane things like chasing criminals through London?"

"Most of the time, yes. I did intend to spend a night in a young woman's bedroom once to relive her last moments, in order to determine the circumstances surrounding her death. I say 'intend' because I ended up solving the case before midnight."

"I'm surprised that you were allowed to spend a night in a dead girl's bedroom."

Sherlock shrugged. "Her sister wanted her death solved, so of course she was willing to allow me to do whatever I needed to."

Movement near the door to the building caught the attention of both of them, and they both turned to look before realising it was merely someone going up to the door rather than anyone coming out. John let out an exasperated sigh and they fell back into silence.

After a moment, Sherlock commented, "It is rather different, having someone with me while I work."

"Different better or different worse?"

"Better, certainly. Helps to have someone to talk to. I can't just carry the skull around; it attracts far too much attention."

John snorted a bit at that. "So you've never had a partner before?" he asked, and Sherlock scoffed.

"Can you imagine me working with any of those idiots from the Yard? Lestrade learnt very quickly that I am better off on my own rather than sending anyone off with me."

"From what you've said about the police, that doesn't surprise me. I didn't necessarily mean working with one of them, though. I meant working with someone you actually like, with a friend or something."

"Friends aren't exactly my area."

"Come on. You're a vampire who has been alive… how many hundred years? Surely you've had friends in that time."

"Nope."

John hesitated for a moment, glancing over at the door to see that Winthers was not on her way out to interrupt their conversation before he looked back at Sherlock. He wasn't sure if this was at all the right time to bring this up. However, they were stuck, sitting in a car with nothing to do but talk and wait, and it might be as good a time as any. He would be lying if he said the thought had not played somewhere in the back of his mind since that conversation with Mycroft.

"What about Victor Trevor?" he asked.

That got Sherlock's attention. His head snapped away from the door to stare at John, and the werewolf saw the way that Sherlock's hands had gone from mindless tapping to holding very still. "How did you know about that?"

"Mycroft mentioned him," John said, noting the way Sherlock's expression turned dark, bordering on dangerous, at his brother's name, "after you..." He trailed off, the words 'fed from me' sounding weird in his head, and instead he gestured to his now fully healed wrist. "He said that I should ask you about him."

"Mycroft had no right," Sherlock began through gritted teeth, voice low, and John was quick to interrupt him.

"Okay, I get it; you don't want to talk about it. It's fine, I'm sorry I asked. You don't have to tell me."

Sherlock turned his head back towards the window, watching the door again without a word, and the silence that stretched between them for a few minutes was tense. John's gaze flickered between the door and Sherlock, watching the expression on his face as it shifted from annoyance to something unreadable. John couldn't help but wonder what was going through his mind, what he was remembering.

Sherlock's gaze flickered towards him, catching John's eye before turning quickly back to the building, but then, much to John's surprise, he spoke.

"He was a friend," he said quietly.

When a moment passed without another word, John figured that maybe it was best if he did press the topic a little. If Sherlock had started talking, maybe it meant that he was willing to discuss it, but it certainly did not seem like he would discuss it without a little nudge in that direction.

"So what happened?"

Sherlock was silent for the longest moment, and John was beginning to think that the vampire wasn't going to talk at all, until he finally broke the silence. The vampire's voice was soft, but his tone was neutral, conveying nothing. "When I was turned, all my senses were heightened, and the experience was overwhelming. I couldn't think logically, I could only run off instincts, and instincts were to do whatever was necessary to survive." He paused for a beat, and something seemed to flicker over his expression before it hardened again. "Victor found me a few days after I had been turned, and he smelt of blood and cocaine and I lost control."

John had known that it was coming, really, from the moment Sherlock said 'survive', but the words still caused his breath to catch. "Sherlock..." he began, but the vampire cut him off.

"Don't," he said tightly. "I am not the victim in this equation."

"No, but..."

Sherlock sat up suddenly, making John start, and he gestured towards the building. "There she is," he said, and John followed his gaze to where the young woman was exiting the door, looking around before she pulled her hood up over her head and turned, beginning to walk. Sherlock turned the key in the ignition, the car quietly rumbling to life, and John put his seatbelt back on as Sherlock pulled out of the parking spot and began to drive slowly after the girl, the conversation over but not forgotten.


	32. Chapter 32

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to my lovely beta, Becca (LlamaWithaPen). Her response when she read this chapter was to send me many keyboard slams. Just a word of warning. Enjoy!

Following Katerina Winthers home was not quite as straight forward as it could have been.

It was not an illogical assumption, to have believed that Winthers would choose to drive home, or perhaps catch a cab. However, it was an assumption that Sherlock would beat himself up for later if it cost them the case, because the assumption was wrong. Winthers being on foot meant she was easy to keep up with in terms of pace – the streets were quiet enough for Sherlock to drive so slowly that he stayed behind her without holding up traffic – but it also meant that Winthers had the option of taking paths and shortcuts that were too narrow for a car. It was only two streets later when she turned off onto a path, preventing them from following.

Fortunately, Sherlock's mental map of London was intricate. John hadn't even had time to finish saying 'Where's she going?' when the vampire stepped on the accelerator, and after rolling slowly for several minutes, the sudden speed forced John backwards. He instinctively grabbed the bottom of his seat.

"I hope you know what you're doing," he said.

"Of course I do," Sherlock replied, speeding around a corner and forcing John side-first into the door.

Reckless driving aside, however, Sherlock was right. He did know what he was doing. When their car rounded a corner two minutes later (after two minutes of John wondering if werewolves could die in car crashes or if he'd just emerge with several broken bones), they were behind Winthers again. John had to stare at the back of her figure for a moment in disbelief, because it seemed impossible that that twisted detour could have gotten them to the same destination as that straight path that Winthers had taken, but apparently it had. John just hoped that she stuck to main streets now so that they did not need to repeat that.

"Won't she get suspicious about us following her?" John asked as their car slowed down again, pulling up on the side of the street as if it were about to park. The road was straight; they would be able to see when Winthers turned off, presuming that she did not go into one of these houses there, and it would be less suspicious for them to park than it would be to continue to roll down the street after her.

"Most people are rather oblivious."

"But she's a hunter. Vigilance is kind of in the job description, don't you think?"

"Perhaps," Sherlock murmured, "and perhaps that's a good thing. She might be a bit easier to convince if she's a bit tenser."

"Or she might be a bit more prepared to shoot both of us in the chest."

"For a soldier, you really have no sense of adventure."

Winthers turned to walk up the driveway to a small house at the end of the street, and Sherlock pulled the keys out of the ignition. "Time for our own meeting, I think," he said, climbing out of the car.

"God help me," John murmured, and followed.

OoO

Winthers' house was not very large – a single story building not dissimilar to the others on the street. The paint on the door and the window frames was peeling, but the handle was still shiny – Winther had changed the locks, upgrading from the cheap ones that were on the rest of the houses in the street. Clever girl – even an amateur could pick those ones. Unfortunately for her, Sherlock was capable of picking locks far more complicated than these ones.

He walked up to the front door and listened. From inside the house, he could hear the sound of running water. Winthers had gotten into the shower. Oh, she was making this too easy.

The vampire dropped to his knees in front of the door, pulling out his lock-pick kit from one of his pockets. John stood behind him, crouched down as well to avoid being in view of the window, even though Sherlock was certain that John's own hearing must be good enough for him to know that the woman in the bathroom and not close enough to the window to see.

"You sure you can pick that quickly enough?" he hissed under his breath. Sherlock didn't grace him with an answer. The door handle turning successfully only a matter of moments later proved his point for him.

The shower was still running as he pushed the door open, stepping quietly into the house. There was a narrow hallway with doors either side, and Sherlock could see that the room to their left had another exit. He gestured to John to go in that direction while he continued through the hall, moving towards where he could hear the water coming from. He could feel his fangs lengthening in his mouth, his whole body on high alert. He could hear the sound of the floorboards beneath his feet, and John's own steps moving through the other room, almost completely masked by the louder sound of running water pounding against the shower tiles.

And as he moved further down the hall, coming up to an open doorway leading to a darkened room, he realised that, nearby, he could hear the sound of one too many heartbeats.

The girl came at him from the doorway, one hand grabbing onto his elbow and her knee going for his stomach. She was strong, for such a small human – nothing compared to a vampire, but she had had the element of surprise. Sherlock doubled over, but immediately grabbed the ankle of the foot that had come up to kick him – still in the air – and twisted, forcing her to lose her balance and fall. Something fell from her other hand and clattered to the floor – a gun, Sherlock realised as his attention was drawn by the sound. Her back hit the floor, but she was quick to kick Sherlock's legs, and while this wasn't enough to force them out from underneath him, the couple of seconds it took for him to regain his balance was long enough for her to get back on her feet and reach for the gun again.

She aimed the gun, but Sherlock didn't give her a chance to fire; he grabbed her arm and pushed her backwards, pinning it against the door frame to stop her from pointing the gun at him. However, she was clever, and prepared; she twisted her wrist and fired the gun, and Sherlock had no choice but to release her in order to dodge the bullet, stumbling a few steps into the room to do so. It gave her the opportunity to take aim once again, holding the gun with both hands and –

"I wouldn't, if I were you," said John from the open doorway, and both Sherlock and the young woman's attention immediately turned to him and the gun held out in front of him.

Winthers didn't lower her gun straight away. She kept it aimed at Sherlock, her gaze flickering between him and John, clearly trying to plan, to work out how she could get out of this situation.

"You know we're both faster than you," John said, his voice very calm and steady. It was almost as though he seemed at home, with a gun in his hand. It definitely was not the sort of situation that any ordinary person should feel at home in. "You won't manage a shot without me getting there first. Put the gun down."

Winthers did nothing for a long moment, but then, finally, did as John said. Very slowly, she let one hand fall, and then the other, lowering the gun to her side. At John's look, she bent down and put it carefully on the floor, holding her other hand in the air in a position of surrender. As soon as the gun left her hand, she put it up too, and stood slowly.

"Back," John said, and Winthers did as she was told, taking careful steps backwards that allowed John to walk forwards, further into the room so that he could take the fallen gun and put the safety on, reaching over to pass it to Sherlock without lowering his own gun. The moment Sherlock took it, studying it for a moment before putting it in the back if his trousers for later inspection, John moved his other hand to his own gun as well.

Winthers had backed up as far as she could go in the small room; her back had hit the desk against the wall, and her hands were still up in the surrender position. "You can put that down," she said coldly, gaze flickering to the gun in John's hands. "I'm unarmed, what else can I do?"

Sherlock answered in John's place. "We'd rather keep it there until you've answered a few of our questions."

Her gaze shifted to glare at Sherlock instead. "I'd rather not answer any questions while there's a gun pointed at my head, if it's all the same with you."

Sherlock took a step forward and parted his lips just enough for her to catch a glimpse of his fangs. "It's in your best interest to answer us," he said. "Believe me, bullets are the least of your worries."

Winthers said nothing, but Sherlock thought he saw something flicker in her eyes. Although she kept herself composed (Sherlock did commend her for that), she looked like she was almost afraid. Good.

"Who hired you?" he said, and when Winthers did nothing but glare, he repeated, "Tell us who hired you."

"Why should I tell you anything?"

Sherlock opened his mouth to make some sort of threat about the value of her life – he would rather avoid killing her, but she did not need to know that – but John spoke before he had the chance.

"We don't want to hurt you," he said, his tone completely different from the calm and dangerous one that he had used moments ago. To prove his point, he lowered his gun, and Sherlock felt suddenly on edge. He would have protested, told John to keep the gun where it was, but something had shifted in Winthers' demeanour. He wouldn't have called it relaxing, but her expression seemed slightly less cold. It made her look more vulnerable. It made her look less like a hunter and more like a scared young woman.

John's comment from the car, his question about what had happened to bring her to this life, came to Sherlock's mind.

John continued, "We just need the name of your employer, and then we'll leave. We don't have to hurt you. You just need to give us the name."

"I can't," Winthers said, meeting John's gaze and holding it. "Either you kill me for keeping quiet, or they kill me for saying anything."

John's demeanour softened, and he took a step closer, coming across as reassuring rather than threatening. "Maybe we can help you," he said, glancing over at Sherlock before returning his gaze to the girl. "We can protect you. Maybe we can get you out of this organisation."

The young woman's eyes flickered between John and Sherlock, the aggression quickly fading from her expression. Her shoulders fell, and she slowly lowered her hands to rest them on the table behind her. "Can you?" she asked quietly after a pause.

John nodded his head, taking another couple of steps towards her and speaking in a gentle tone, like the way one might talk to a scared child. "Of course we can," he said softly. "We just need your help first in learning about the organisation that you work for. We just need to know who is running it."

Winthers hesitated, dropping her gaze, and Sherlock wanted to push her, to raise his voice and threaten her to get her to speak quickly – really now, they didn't have all day – but John's unusual method seemed to be getting more out of her. So, with great effort, he stayed quiet, trying his best not to let his impatience show on his face.

Finally, the woman spoke. "I didn't have a choice," she said. Sherlock resisted the urge to sigh, realising that she was about to tell her story, rather than just giving them the name that they needed. Really, did people have to be so tedious? "He offered me a job, and I was desperate. I don't have a family, I didn't have any money. I didn't know what else to do."

John put a gentle hand on her arm in a comforting gesture, and she flinched at the touch before glancing at him and relaxing slightly. "It's okay," John told her. "Do you know his name?"

Winthers dropped her gaze and shifted her weight between her feet, hesitating for a moment. Perhaps she was battling internally with herself, between her loyalty to the organisation and the promise of safety that John had offered. The latter won out. She took a breath, and said, "Moriarty."

"Moriarty," John said, looking over his shoulder at Sherlock – perhaps to see if the name meant anything to the vampire – and that was when Winthers moved.

Sherlock's attention had been on John, so he only saw the movement out of the corner of his eye; he didn't have time to properly take in the situation. He saw her swing her arm quickly and John reacted just as fast, perhaps on instinct; he raised the gun and fired as her fist hit his middle. The smell of blood told Sherlock that the bullet had hit even before her cry of pain, and her hand went to her shoulder. It didn't stop her from running, though, going to move past Sherlock, and Sherlock went to make a grab for her. He got one arm around her middle before she tore her hand away from her shoulder, and Sherlock only managed to catch a glimpse of silver in her hand before she jabbed it into his arm - a small knife, he realised, and although it wasn't wood, the moment of pain before his body's healing kicked in forced him to let go, giving her long enough to race around the corner.

The knife clattered to the floor and Sherlock rushed after her, getting around the corner in time to see Winther's back as she jumped out the window. Sherlock went to follow, and then froze. He could smell blood, he realised, and it wasn't just from the wound to Winthers' shoulder.

The knife that Winthers had stabbed Sherlock with had had blood on it before it hit his arm.

The knife had been made of silver.

Sherlock grabbed onto the door frame and all but flung himself around it, back into the room. John was still standing by the table, one hand on his abdomen, and Sherlock could see the red stain spreading over the fabric of his shirt.

"John!" he exclaimed as the werewolf fell forward, and Sherlock rushed over, dropping to his knees beside the werewolf, his eyes fixing on the stain. The scent of blood was overwhelming, filling his nostrils. It was all he could focus on. He couldn't think straight. Winthers was all but gone from his mind. There was so much blood, and Sherlock knew how that blood tasted; he could remember it flowing down the back of his throat. He could remember it flowing through his veins.

"Sherlock." John's voice was weak, raspy, and Sherlock tore his gaze away from his abdomen to meet John's eyes. "Focus."

Sherlock let out his breath and did his best to block out the smell. "What do I do?" he asked, sounding desperate.

John's hand was slipping away from his abdomen, and Sherlock moved quickly to cover the wound, putting pressure on it. "John!" he said, a little more forcefully. "John, come on, you're the doctor here. Stay with me." But Sherlock could already hear John's heartbeat slowing down. He put more pressure on the injury, swearing under his breath.

He couldn't call an ambulance. He hadn't studied werewolf biology, but it would be safe to say that a simple blood test would show something abnormal, and John definitely ran hotter than humans. There were too many risks involved in seeing human doctors. However, Sherlock wasn't a doctor, and John would bleed out if they just stayed here.

Sherlock left one hand on the wound and pulled out his phone.


	33. Chapter 33

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to the brilliant Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for editing this for me. Without her, there would be many more typos.

When John woke up, he was in a hospital.

At least, he thought it was a hospital. It certainly seemed like a hospital, when he was hovering somewhere in that fuzzy state between awake and dreaming. It smelt of steriliser, like a hospital. The woman in the room was dressed in a white coat, like a nurse would in a hospital. He had been undressed from the waist up, and there were bandages over his abdomen, as well as needles stuck into his arm, hooking him up to an IV bag. Given his last memory was of being in pain, bleeding, you could not blame him for assuming that he would be in a hospital.

However, as he woke up, becoming increasingly aware of his surroundings, he couldn't help but think that there was something a little bit off about all of it. The walls weren't white, for instant. Hospitals always had white walls, so that they could easily be kept clean; this wallpaper was completely impractical. On top of this, there was the fact that he was not hooked up to a proper heart monitor, not like the ones you would see in a hospital. His pulse was instead being monitored by a more portable (but undoubtedly less precise) device on a wristband. In addition, there was also the unmistakeable scent, not quite masked by the steriliser, of vampire, and it was just a little bit too strong to suggest that this was just a hospital where a vampire had passed through.

Oh, and the fact that his arms were tied to the bed probably said something as well.

He tried to struggle against the restraints, but his muscles were not yet at the point of cooperating, and his attempts at even moving proved futile. They did, however, draw the attention of the nurse – if she was a real nurse – in the room, who looked up from the clipboard in her hands.

"You're awake," she said. "I wasn't sure how long you would be out for. I haven't treated a werewolf before."

Definitely not a normal hospital, then. John made another attempt at struggling against the restraints, hoping that the expression on his face leaned more towards a dangerous glare than a pitiful plea. "Let me go."

Clearly, however, John did not looked very threatening, as the woman appeared unfazed. "Don't worry," she said calmly. "You're not in any danger." When John glanced pointedly at the restraints, she added, "I do apologise for those. They're merely a precaution. We weren't sure how you would react when you weren't fully conscious and we didn't want you to put yourself or anyone else at risk. Mr Holmes did insist."

"Sherlock?" John asked, and the woman shook her head.

"No, Mycroft Holmes," she replied, and realisation dawned on him.

"I'm in his house, aren't I?"

The woman nodded her head wordlessly, stepping closer to him and taking a look at his wrist so that she could take note of his heart rate. "You're lucky," she said as she took hold of the clipboard again. "The cut wasn't deep and it didn't hit anything major, so you just needed a few stitches and a small blood transfusion."

"With... whose blood?"

The woman looked up at him, looking faintly amused. "A human's, don't worry. I wasn't going to give you vampire blood without knowing what sort of reaction you would have." She put the clipboard down at the end of the bed and then moved back up so that she could (finally) begin undoing the restraints.

"Who are you, anyway?" John found himself asking. "How do you know about all this?"

"I'm Hannah," the woman said, moving around the bed to the other restraint once one was removed. "I work for Mr Holmes."

"A private doctor? For a vampire?"

Hannah smiled faintly. "I'm required about as often as you can imagine. However, there are rare occasions when Mr Holmes – or, more frequently, his brother – does require some sort of medical attention, so they need someone available who has some understanding of their biology." She undid the restraint, and then met John's eyes and smiled, adding, "Seems a good thing I was around for your sake, as well."

John glanced down at his now unrestrained wrists, and then at his abdomen, at the bandages covering his side. "Seems so," he added.

"I should go inform Mr Holmes that you're awake. Don't get out of bed." She gave him one last look before turning and disappearing from the room, leaving John by himself.

At least, he was by himself for a moment. The door had barely had the chance to fall shut before it was yanked open again and Sherlock stepped inside.

"Finally," the vampire said, letting the door fall shut behind him as he moved into the room. "I was beginning to think she'd never leave. How long have you been awake for?"

"Um, not long. A few minutes, I guess. Why, how long was I out for?"

"A few hours. You're looking a lot less pale than you did before. I imagine your healing will still be fast even though the wound was made with a silver knife."

"Who even has a silver knife just lying around, anyway?"

"Hunters who know that they have a werewolf to deal with."

"Right." John raised his arm, strength slowly coming back to him, and he stretched it out, circling his wrist a few times now that the restraints had been taken away. He went to lower it again, but Sherlock reached out suddenly and grasped onto it, leaning in to inspect the marks that the restraints had left.

"They tied you down," he said, and John raised his eyebrows at the note of surprise in Sherlock's tone.

"You didn't know?"

"Mycroft's doctor doesn't like me very much," Sherlock replied, shrugging dismissively. "She wouldn't let me in to see you. Had I known that they tried to restrain you, I would have done something about it. Really, Mycroft should have known better. How likely was it that you'd shift while unconscious after sustaining an injury? Your body would preserve energy by keeping you in this form."

John shrugged one shoulder, going to shift to sit more upright but then stopping himself at a twinge of pain from his side. "It was just to be on the safe side. I wouldn't have known for sure what I'd do, anyway. Better I'm tied down than I go on some sort of rampage through your brother's house without even being fully awake."

"That might have been amusing."

John rolled his eyes, and then looked down at his stomach again. "What happened to Winthers?"

Sherlock shrugged dismissively. "She got away. It hardly matters. We got what we needed from her."

John thought back to the name that the girl had uttered seconds before she drove a silver knife into John's side. "Moriarty," he said, and Sherlock nodded his head.

"Moriarty."

"Is that name familiar to you at all?"

"Not in the slightest. But, it does put us one step closer than we were yesterday." He paused, and then his expression changed and he added, in a different tone of voice, "Well, we would have been, if it weren't for the fact that your decision to get stabbed has put us two steps back."

"My decision? I'm sorry; I didn't  _choose_  to get stabbed."

"No, but you did choose to lower your gun and go up to her. She's a trained hunter, John, and you practically walked right up to her with a target on your stomach."

"She was talking! I thought it was working!"

"You should have known she was manipulating you."

"I didn't see you doing anything to stop her either," John said, raising his voice a little bit louder than he intended to, and then Sherlock's gaze flickered away for a fraction of a second and realisation dawned on John's face. "You didn't know," he said, lowering his voice again. "She manipulated you too; you're just as annoyed at yourself."

Sherlock's gaze snapped back to John's and hardened quickly. "Don't psychoanalyse me. You're not that sort of doctor."

"I don't need to be."

Sherlock gave him a look, and then tilted his head, apparently listening to something. John did the same, identifying the sound of two sets of footsteps approaching the makeshift hospital. Sherlock straightened up.

"My brother undoubtedly wants to talk with you," he said. "Mainly because he wants to talk to me, and I've been avoiding him for the past several hours, which I'm going to continue to do. Besides, I'm sure you need to... rest or something. Whatever it is that normal bodies need to facilitate healing." He moved towards the door and then paused, adding, "Feel free to give my brother the name of the employer. He was the one who gave me this case to start off with, after all," before he stepped out the door.

OoO

Sherlock was right (as usual): Mycroft did want to talk to John, after Hannah finished checking him over. Or, more correctly, Mycroft wanted to talk  _through_  John, because once he had asked John how he was feeling, the elder Holmes brother immediately leapt into questions that probably would have been more suited to Sherlock, questions that Sherlock would have undoubtedly been asked if he had not been avoiding his brother.

The questions were centred on the case, at first, asking for John's perspective on what had happened with Winthers (Sherlock might have been avoiding his brother now, but he had to have said something to explain why John required medical attention somewhere other than at a hospital) and for the information that they had gathered from her. He informed John that he had sent men out to Winthers' house to wait for her return, and others to search for her, but they had had no luck as of yet, and he promised to do what he could with the name that they had been given – Moriarty – in an attempt to discover who, or what, this Moriarty was and how they could find him.

After that, however, Mycroft began asking questions more directly related to Sherlock – questions about what he was doing when he wasn't working on this case, and particularly about how often he was feeding. He spent a moment rather pointedly studying John's neck as if he was searching for marks, stating that he could tell that Sherlock had not been feeding from John since the first time, but he was curious to know whether or not the conversation had come up, and what both John and Sherlock thought about the matter.

John, naturally, told him nothing of interest. Sherlock was fine, he said, Sherlock fed reasonably regularly, and any information about any aspect of John and Sherlock's relationship, including any discussions of feeding, was none of Mycroft's business.

"You needn't treat me like the enemy," Mycroft told him. "We're on the same side."

"Are we? I didn't know there were sides."

"We both care about Sherlock's wellbeing, don't we? We're both interested in the same thing."

"Yep," said John, "and we can both be interested in that without me needing to tell you everything he does every minute of the day. I'm pretty sure invading his privacy like that might actually be detrimental to his wellbeing."

Mycroft gave him a look that combined annoyed and condescending with a hint of threatening, but John merely met his gaze with the most serious one that he could muster while he was bedridden due to injury. Fortunately, John's expression seemed to win out.

"I can see there's no arguing with you," Mycroft said. "All the same, you know how to contact me if ever it's necessary, and I trust you'll make the correct decision on that matter."

John responded with nothing more than a raise of his eyebrows, and then Mycroft straightened up, glancing towards the door as it opened and Hannah stepped inside.

"Am I interrupting?" she asked politely, and Mycroft shook his head.

"No, thank you, Hannah, I was just about to leave so that Doctor Watson could have some rest," he said, and Hannah gave him a nod before stepping over to John's bed.

"I have some more painkillers for you, if you'd like them," she said, and John nodded. The pain wasn't bad, really – it was nothing compared to getting shot – but it still wasn't a pleasant sensation and it was one that he was rather eager to get rid of if given the option. She walked over to a small desk that was being used to hold all of the tools – John could see syringes, from where he was sitting, along with the needle and thread that were undoubtedly used to stitch him up. He wondered briefly how much of this Hannah already had and how much someone needed to go and find. He was pretty sure the heart monitor is a new purchase, given the fact that he didn't think vampires have heartbeats.

Hannah filled the syringe and returned to John's side, gently taking hold of his arm so that she could inject it. "We're going to keep you here for the rest of the day, and probably overnight as well," she said. "You're doing well, but I'd like to keep an eye on you, just in case."

John grimaced at the thought of being stuck here, but he knew that this was for the best. With any luck, his biology would allow him to heal faster and he would be out of here in no time.

"I'll let you rest," said Mycroft, nodding to Hannah before he stepped out of the room, and once the doctor had marked down the painkiller dosage on John's clipboard, she turned to do the same.

"I'll come and check in on you shortly," she said, "and there's a bell you can ring if you need anything. Try to get some rest."

She stepped out of the room, and John sighed, but closed his eyes. Resting would get him out of here faster, anyway.


	34. Chapter 34

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks again to Becca (LlamaWithAPen!)

John did manage to get some sleep, after Hannah left. He couldn't tell how long he slept for, with the curtains drawn to block out all light from the window and without a clock in the room to tell him how much time had passed. What he could be sure of, however, was that he managed to sleep for at least an hour or two, because he managed to enter some of the deeper stages of sleep, allowing him to dream. Unfortunately, rather than allowing him to feel well-rested, it was the deeper stages of sleep and consequently the dreams that caused him to wake, forcing him into consciousness to rid the images from his mind.

He couldn't remember exactly what he dreamt of, once he had woken. It hardly mattered, though, because he had a pretty good guess. His nightmares were almost always the same – Afghanistan, or shifting, or sometimes shifting in Afghanistan. They were closer to memories than they were to dreams; they might not be perfectly accurate, but there was always some truth to them, always stemming from reality. That just made it so much harder to calm down from the state of panic he would wake up in; he could not take a deep breath and tell himself that it was just a dream and that it wasn't real, because it had been real and he could not change that.

So, just as John had done so many times in his own bedsit, he woke with a start, heart pounding against his ribcage and chest heaving as he gasped for air.

It did not help that he woke to find Sherlock's face hovering over him – a view that would give anyone a fright regardless of whether they had woken from a nightmare or not.

"Jesus Christ," he said, raising the arm not attached to the IV to push him away, and he was pleased to discover that he had a little bit more strength than he had the last time he had been awake. He did not quite have the strength that would have been required to push Sherlock away if the vampire had resisted or fought against him, but fortunately it was enough for Sherlock to take a hint and lean back, putting more distance in between them.

"You were having a nightmare," Sherlock said, as if that both explained and justified the vampire's position. "You were squirming."

"So you thought it was a good idea to just stand over me and give me a heart attack when I woke up?"

"I thought I'd keep an eye on you in case your movements got violent enough to pull out your catheter. I did not intend on waking you unless it became necessary."

The explanation made more sense than John might have expected it to, and a part of him was almost flattered that Sherlock had cared enough to want to keep an eye on John and make sure that he was okay without waking him up. The werewolf rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and shifted in an attempt to make himself comfortable, wincing at a twinge of pain on his side. He noticed Sherlock's gaze flicker down to his bandaged abdomen.

"Should I go find Hannah?" the vampire asked, and John shook his head.

"No, I'm okay. She'd be down here if it was time for my next dose of painkillers. What time is it?"

Sherlock pulled his phone out of his pocket to check. "Ten-thirty," he answered.

"At night?"

"No, in the morning."

John groaned, and he squeezed his eyes shut tight for a moment. "Christ. My body clock is going to be a mess after this."

"It's one day, John, I'm sure you'll manage to get back to your strict sleeping habits fairly quickly."

"You can talk. Do vampires even have body clocks?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes in response, which did not answer John's question at all.

After a moment, Sherlock seemed to remember something, and he pulled a phone out of his pocket, handing it to John. John glanced down at it, and realised that it was his own. Sherlock must have taken it from John's pocket when the werewolf was changed out of his clothes.

"Your manager called," Sherlock said. "Several times. Your ringtone was annoying me."

John swore under his breath, realising immediately why Sarah would have been calling. "I was supposed to work today."

"Yes, she did mention that."

"God, Sarah's going to-" John started, before Sherlock's words caught up with him, and he froze. "Wait, hold on, did you answer the calls?"

"As I said, your ringtone was annoying me."

"Do I still have a job?"

"They're hardly going to fire you for being injured."

"No, I mean do I still have a job after  _you_  had a conversation with Sarah? I've seen the way you talk to people."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I am capable of being civil when it's necessary. Your manager seemed more concerned than annoyed and told me to wish you well."

"Thank God for that," John muttered. "What did you tell her? I doubt 'John won't be into work today because he got stabbed with a silver knife while hunting a vampire hunter' would have gone down very well."

"Of course not. I told her that you were injured and that you would contact her when it became clear how much time you would need off work."

"And she didn't ask what had happened?"

"Of course she did. I told her it was not my place to say and she seemed to accept that."

"Thank God," John said with a sigh, leaning his head back against the pillow that he had propped up against the headboard. "She'll want a medical certificate for proof, though. Hannah could write one for me, can't she?"

"Hannah is a doctor, John, despite the fact that she treats a select number of patients who are not human. I'm sure she's capable of writing out a note to support your story."

"Right. Okay, good. Good."

A brief moment of silence stretched between them, and then Sherlock moved, sitting down at the edge of the bed by John's blanketed feet. "I have told you before that it's illogical of you to assume that you can hold down a stable position of employment given what you are."

"You told me that months ago," John replied. "I've held down this job for a while now, despite taking days off every month. I don't think anyone has noticed the overlap between the days I'm away and the full moon yet, and it's not like I've accidentally turned at work and bitten anyone. So I'm fine. You were wrong."

"It's not just what you are, now, however," Sherlock pointed out. "It's what you do with me. While I don't intend on letting you end up in anything resembling a hospital again, I can't guarantee that this line of work will allow you to keep a regular day job. Criminals and hunters don't work around a predictable roster."

"I've managed so far, haven't I?"

"So far, yes. Now that we know the name of the employer, we're going to be able to find more of his employees, and some days I might need you to come with me unexpectedly, regardless of whether or not you were supposed to work."

John frowned. "Are you asking me to choose between you and my job?"

"I'm just asking you to consider whether or not it is practical for you to keep your job, given both your biology and your work here with me."

"Look, Sherlock." John sat himself up a little straighter (careful, of course, not to pull on his side), and he met Sherlock's gaze. "You need to remember that there isn't some charity that donates money to werewolves who are unable to work. I need a job, and so far, I've managed to juggle working and helping you and everything else that comes with being what I am. So I'm going to keep working, and I'm going to keep helping you, because you kind of need it." He kept talking before Sherlock had the chance to open his mouth and protest. "At the moment, let me just focus on healing so I can get back to work. We can cross bridges when we get to them."

Sherlock frowned for a moment, but then nodded his head. "If that's what you think is best," he said, and then he glanced at John's side again. "Are you sure you don't need me to go find Hannah?"

John shook his head. "No, not yet. Although, if you're offering, I wouldn't mind something to eat." He paused for a moment, and then asked, "Your brother does have actual, normal food in his house, right? Or is it all blood? I'm hungry, but I'm not that hungry."

"My brother has human staff, so he's bound to keep human food somewhere. And I happen to know that he still eats cake despite being a vampire." Sherlock pushed himself off the bed and stood up. "I'll go see what I can find."

OoO

Much to John's relief, Sherlock did manage to find him some food – there was not a large range of options, but there was enough to make up a sandwich (made, of course, but one of Mycroft's employees and not by Sherlock himself). The man who prepared it also brought in some tea, which John was far happier about than he should have been, and he finished both the food and the drink hurriedly. Sherlock seemed to find this almost amusing.

"You'd think you'd been starving for days," the vampire commented, watching with raised eyebrows as John washed down the last mouthful of his sandwich with his tea.

"I feel like I've been starving for days," John replied. "Being stabbed kind of takes a lot out of you." He leaned over to put the teacup back down on the tray, which had been left on a small table beside the bed, but Sherlock caught his wrist before he could stretch too far, taking the cup from him and putting it down so that John didn't pull his stitches. John glared at him in protest.

"I'm not incapable of doing things myself, you know. I've had worse."

"I'd rather not have you incapacitated for longer than you have to be," Sherlock replied. "You're no good to me if you're bedridden."

John glanced down at the bandages over his side once again, wondering how long he would be incapacitated for. The bullet wound he had received in Afghanistan was much worse than this, so he couldn't use that for comparison, and any other injuries he had received had been when he was still human. Werewolves were supposed to heal faster, according to both Sherlock and Hannah, but he did not have the faintest clue how much faster 'faster' was, nor did he know how the fact that the knife had been silver would have impacted his healing.

When he looked back up at Sherlock again, he realised that the vampire was staring at him with a rather intense look of thought on his face. John frowned. "What?"

"I want to run some tests on your blood."

John's eyebrows shot up to his hairline. "Excuse me?"

"You heard correctly."

John glanced briefly at the catheter in his arm, where he had been connected to a blood bag to make up for the blood loss resulting from being stabbed. "When you say run tests..."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I mean run tests, in the scientific sense, and not anything that involves the blood going anywhere near my mouth. Really, John, do I come across as the sort of person who would lie to you just to feed from you? Besides, I don't think you can afford losing any more right now."

"You can't blame me for making assumptions. You're a vampire asking for my blood, what am I supposed to think?"

"Do you really think so low of me? I'm clever, John, and manipulative, I won't deny that, but I'd hardly go to such ridiculous lengths in order to feed from someone."

John shrugged his shoulders in response. "Just making sure. You seemed to kind of get distracted by my blood for a moment before."

Sherlock looked away and said nothing.

"Anyway," John said, moving on. "Why do you want to run tests on my blood?"

"If vampire blood is given to a human in a small enough dose, so it isn't enough to start the turning process, it can facilitate healing," Sherlock explained. "I don't know if it has the same effect on werewolves. I'd like to run some tests to see if there's something I can do to help you heal faster."

John frowned, considering this for a moment. It sounded strange, at first, but as he thought about it he realised that it wouldn't be that much different to having a blood transfusion with any other sort of blood. After a stretch of silence, he said, "Yeah, okay, that's reasonable enough. You can ask Hannah if she'll take a sample when she comes back." Sherlock opened his mouth, but John spoke before he could. "And yes, I am insisting that  _Hannah_  takes the sample, because she is a doctor and I'd rather not have anyone else sticking pointy things in my arm."

"I can handle a needle, you know. I was once an intravenous drug user."

"That's not as reassuring as you might think, Sherlock."

OoO

Sherlock cornered Hannah when she next returned for John's next dose of painkillers, and thus commenced a brief argument on whether or not it was really necessary that Sherlock have a sample of John's blood for testing. Sherlock won, but only because John decided to pipe up and point out that he was giving permission before the argument turned into a temper tantrum on either side. Hannah did, however, manage to convince Sherlock to wait outside while she took the blood, carefully filling a vial and closing it up to give to the vampire.

"You really are the strangest two people to be friends, you know," she commented as she was taking the blood. "I thought vampires and werewolves were supposed to want to kill each other."

"Oh, believe me, sometimes I do," John replied. Hannah smiled briefly and then straightened up, and Sherlock must have heard something that he decided meant he could come in, as he proceeded to push open the door and hold out his hand expectantly. Hannah looked less than impressed, but she gave him the vial nonetheless.

"If nothing else," she said to John once Sherlock had left, "at least if he's running tests he can't be distracting you from resting."

John chose not to point out that he'd done nothing but rest for several hours, and he probably would have preferred the distraction.


	35. Chapter 35

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this has taken me so long, and I'm sorry in advance if I take even longer for the next few. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it, but I'm kind of in my last semester of my bachelor's, so, as you can imagine, I'm drowning a bit under study, and honours applications, and I'm also putting some of my dance students through an exam and putting a huge group of them into a competition - you can imagine how much free time I have at the moment. Don't worry, though, because I promise I'll be back, and hopefully this chapter will help tide you over until then. Thanks again for all your support; you guys are brilliant.
> 
> A million thank yous to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for being extra brilliant in beta-ing for me. (And, you know, she has a fic called Deducing Daisies that you could definitely check out while you're waiting for my next update.)

John's blood was  _fascinating_.

Sherlock ended up spending hours in St Bart's Hospital, taking advantage of the labs and the equipment there to study the vial of blood that Hannah had let him have. Determining whether or not it would be safe and beneficial if John were to be injected with a small amount of Sherlock's blood was a simple enough test, but while Sherlock was here and while he had some spare time, he could not resist running some extra tests of his own. After all, John would probably spend most of the day sleeping while his body healed. Sherlock would not be missed that much.

John's blood was only subtly different from human blood, which was perhaps in part the reason that Sherlock was so interested in studying it. Looking through a microscope, if you did not know what you were looking for, you might not have realised that John was anything other than human. However, Sherlock knew the smell of it. He also knew the taste of it, which he was rather pointedly not thinking about, especially not while he had a small vial of it in his possession. He knew it was different, and he needed to know how.

So he spent hours. There would always be unanswered questions about John's biology - Bart's did not offer him everything that could be used to study John's blood, and even with access to all the resources he could desire, there was only so much that a small sample of John's blood could tell him. However, that small sample of John's blood could tell him something, and Sherlock wanted to know anything that he could.

By the time he left the hospital, the sun was already sinking below the horizon; he had completely lost track of the time while he was there. He caught a cab back to his brother's house, and he made his way up the driveway with the intention of going straight to John's room to discuss his discoveries, and then finding somewhere to hide away from his brother.

Unfortunately, his brother took away that option, by waiting for him at the front door.

"Hello, brother mine," Mycroft said, pretending not to notice Sherlock's groan. "I do hope you weren't planning on avoiding me for the duration of John's stay here."

"That was the idea."

"Now, now, Sherlock, no need to be childish. Don't forget that I have so kindly opened up my home to your werewolf once again, as well as provided a member of my own personal staff."

"So now I'm eternally in your debt?"

"Of course not. I just think you should show me a little more respect. Mummy would be quite upset with you if she could see you now."

Sherlock met his brother's eyes, purely to shoot him a glare. "I don't know why you insist we need to talk," he said. "I'm certain John has told you everything you need to know about the case."

"Can't I want to have a nice chat with my little brother?"

"You and I don't do nice chats, Mycroft."

"Nor do you normally show such concern about another person, let alone a werewolf. I've never seen you show quite this much... emotion, especially not when it comes to someone else."

"Whatever you're implying..."

"I'm not implying anything. I'm merely observing that you were quite panicked when you contacted me."

"I was not panicked. John was bleeding, so I had to contact you quickly. I was being efficient, nothing more."

"Of course you were. And I suppose you weren't at all bothered by the smell of his blood."

Sherlock met Mycroft's eyes with a cold, steady gaze. "What are you saying, Mycroft?"

"You fed from him."

"Yes, once. Because I had been shot and he lifted a bleeding cut to my lips. I can control myself."

"Can you? Because the last time you fed from a living being, I had to lock you up."

"Oh, please. 'Had to lock me up', like it was some great chore on your part, and not a decision you made because you feel the need to run everyone else's life as well as your own. Excuse me, Mycroft. I have things to do." Sherlock brushed past Mycroft's shoulder as he passed him, and Mycroft did not try to stop him from heading down the hall towards the room where John was staying.

"I'm merely looking out for you, brother," the older vampire said behind him, and Sherlock pointedly ignored him, pushing open the door and stepping into the room.

He could hear John's heartbeat, slow and steady – John was not quite asleep, but he was certainly relaxed, perhaps about to drift off. However, the werewolf turned his head to look over at Sherlock as he stepped through the door, and immediately he looked as though he was wide awake. He shifted, carefully propping up one of the pillows so that he could be more upright while still leaning back against something. Sherlock let the door shut behind him and walked over, taking a seat by the foot of John's bed.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Like I've been stabbed in the stomach," John replied. "How'd your experiment go?"

Sherlock's eyes lit up immediately, and he sat up straighter. "Your blood is  _remarkable_ , John!" he exclaimed, ready to launch into a complete explanation of every test that he had run and every discovery that he had made. However, he got no further than "at first" when John sighed, and cut him off.

"Sherlock," he interrupted. "I'm tired. Can we just pretend that I don't have a medical degree or any knowledge about blood and cut straight to the chase?"

Sherlock gave him a look that mixed condescending with disappointed. Really, how could John not want to hear about the experiment? This was  _John's_  biology that they were talking about; surely the man would be interested. However, rather than arguing about the reasons why John should be interested, he cut his day of experiments down to a brief summary. "In short," he said, emphasising the words so that John would know that he was cutting this down a lot, "you know that your body heals faster than a human's, although the silver slows that down, so the wound itself will take time to heal. However, the silver should only impact the way your body heals on the surface. Essentially, your body produces blood cells faster than a human."

"So, you're basically saying I recover from blood loss faster?"

Sherlock nodded his head. "It seems so. Of course, that wouldn't have been fast enough for you to have not required the transfusion, but it should mean that you'll get your strength back soon. The wound itself will limit what you're capable of doing for a while yet, of course."

"Huh," John said, glancing down at the bandages on his side. "Well, I suppose the universe owed me something good to make up for the whole monthly bloodthirsty monster transformation."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You shift once a month, John; you have three hundred and fifty-two days in a year where you are able to control yourself, with added strength and enhanced senses. I think the universe gave you a good deal."

"Easy for you to say. You get all the physical enhancements, minus the full moon stuff."

"You're forgetting that vampires don't wake up after being turned magically able to handle the bloodlust," Sherlock replied, and he saw something like guilt flicker over John's face.

"Right. Of course. Sorry." The werewolf glanced away for a moment, and then returned his gaze to Sherlock. "So. Your experiment. Did you find out if it was worth trying to... give me some of your blood or whatever?"

"Given the fact that you'll recover quickly thanks to your own system, I don't think it's necessary anymore. I did test to see if my blood was compatible with yours, however, and it seems it is, which comes as no surprise given that I fed from you with no adverse effects. So, should you be in need of a blood transfusion again – in the unlikely event that I cannot prevent that – at least we know that you could use my blood, if nothing else was available. Presuming you only require a small amount, of course."

"And that wouldn't turn me into a vampire?"

"I'm fairly certain that werewolves cannot be turned into vampires, and I'm not willing to test that theory on you. The turning process only works if a human's blood is replaced with a vampire's – so, essentially, they die of blood loss in the process. A small enough amount of blood wouldn't be enough."

"You sure that goes for werewolves as well as humans?"

"There's nothing to suggest otherwise. Regardless, I'm not expecting you to be in this circumstance again any time soon, so you requiring my blood for a transfusion is highly unlikely."

"Well. Good to know in the case of an emergency, anyway."

"My thoughts exactly."

OoO

Hannah insisted that John stay at Mycroft's house for one more night, which did not surprise Sherlock. She also informed him that he was not to bother John, because his body needed sleep in order for him to recover, which also did not surprise Sherlock. What did surprise Sherlock was that Mycroft helped her enforce this suggestion by stationing a member of Mycroft's private security outside John's door, for the entire night, so that Sherlock did not even have the option of disobeying her order.

Sherlock informed his brother that the fact that he distrusted Sherlock so much that he felt it necessary to put a security guard outside a room in his own house was ridiculous, and it was even more ridiculous that the guard was there at all times, with the exception of a few minutes for toilet breaks that directly aligned with the times when Hannah came in to check on John. Mycroft informed Sherlock that the fact that Sherlock monitored the door enough during the night to know that it was never left unguarded was proof that the security guard was necessary after all.

(Really, though, it wasn't like Sherlock would actually stop John from sleeping. He wanted John to recover quickly, which meant allowing John to sleep through the night. The fact that Mycroft put a security guard there was the reason why he kept checking if the door was still being guarded, that was all.)

When morning came, Hannah came in to check on John again, and she did (admittedly with some reluctance) allow Sherlock to come in while she changed his bandages, on the condition that Sherlock stood in the corner and behaved himself. Sherlock considered ignoring her orders because, as far as he was concerned, she had no right to order him about, but then he decided that if he did ignore her he might end up locked out of the room again, so, just this once, it was logical for him to do as he was told. Still, standing in the corner gave him a view of John's wound, which was fascinating from a medical standpoint, and it did give him that little bit more insight into werewolf biology and the way John was healing.

After that, Hannah decided that John was fit to go home. She gave him some extra painkillers, told him that he would need to come back to her in a few days' time so that she could remove his stitches, and that he was to take it easy, to take those few days off work until she could assess whether or not he was fit enough to start working again. Mycroft organised a car to take John home, and Sherlock insisted on coming with him – just so he could check John's bedsit again, of course, to make sure that no one had planted anymore cameras or bugs while John was away. He could help John into his bedsit and make sure that he got in safely – for John's sake, of course.

It certainly wasn't because he was worried about the werewolf. That would be sentimental, and Sherlock was nothing of the sort.


	36. Chapter 36

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's back! I'm so, so sorry for the unacceptably long hiatus - this semester has been kind of insane. I didn't get back into posting as soon as I finished my exams, either, because I wanted to get ahead with some of these chapters so that I don't vanish on you again. As of this point, I've written up to chapter 39, so you should expect no more disappearances for at least several weeks. And, here's my promise to you: I'm not leaving again until this fic has finished. I estimate at this point between 42 and 45 chapters. We're reaching the end, guys. It's coming.
> 
> Anyway, let me just say a quick thank you to my very excellent and very patient beta, Becca (LlamaWithAPen), and, of course, thank you to all of you for your patiences. Hopefully you won't need to have that much patience again. (And, in my defence, I'm still faster than the writers of Sherlock.)
> 
> I hope those of you who celebrate it had a very Merry Christmas, and I hope you enjoy this!

John called Sarah as soon as he had the chance, to give her an explanation for his absence and to make sure that he did actually still have a job. He did take some time before calling, of course, to come up with an explanation that was more believable to a normal person than the impossible truth. Eventually, he decided that the best lies were the ones that were wrapped up in honesty. No one would believe that Sherlock was a vampire and he was a werewolf, but they might believe that Sherlock was a consulting detective and that John had been assisting him on a case.

It was easy enough to explain his story with this change in mind, therefore, because it meant that most of the details were fairly close to the truth. He said that they had gone after a suspect in a case, rather than a member of an organisation of supernatural hunters, but he could be truthful in the explanation that the suspect had pulled out a knife and overpowered him. It wasn't the most believable story – it was more believable than the truth, certainly, but it's not every day that someone calls in sick to work due to an injury obtained while working with a detective. However, with the medical certificate to back him up, and with the fact that John, over the past several months that he had been employed there, had (mostly) proven himself to be an honest and responsible employee, Sarah believed him. Or, at least, she accepted the explanation enough to not fire him on the spot, and she asked him to call her when he was available to work again.

After that phone call, however, there was not a lot else that John could do. Although the painkillers helped to take the edge off, and although his injury was not severe enough to really be debilitating, he didn't quite have the strength or the energy to go out, and his tiny bedsit did not offer many options for entertainment.

OoO

Sherlock came over the day after John returned home, which came as a surprise. He then asked John how he was feeling and offered to make tea, which came as an even bigger surprise. (John refused the offer under the assumption that a creature that only drank blood probably would not be able to make a good cuppa). Sherlock then proceeded to take John's laptop so that he could see if he could find any more clues regarding this Moriarty person and how they could find him, which was really no surprise at all.

John couldn't really help much, given that he did not have Sherlock's brain and he did not have the ability to engage in anything physically strenuous at that point in time. Even if he could, they were at a point where there was nothing to do but wait it out. Moriarty had not shown his face yet, and there was nothing that they could do to track him down until he had. Searching for him on databases yielded no results – the man clearly knew how to hide.

Technically speaking, it was John who came up with the idea of bringing Moriarty to them. After several hours of searching and finding nothing, Sherlock had slammed the laptop lid shut in a fit of frustration, and John had commented, absently, that they needed to find some way to make Moriarty show himself. The moment the suggestion was out, Sherlock's eyes lit up in a way that made John's stomach twist.

"What?" John asked.

"We know he's watching us," Sherlock replied, opening up the laptop again and tapping on the keyboard impatiently while he waited for it to start up. "He put a camera in your flat for that reason, so surely he would have wanted a way to keep track of us after we discovered it. It's probably safe to assume that he's watching us in the easiest way that this technological age allows."

"Which is...?"

"Watching our websites."

"Our websites?"

"Yes, my website, and your blog. You did set one up at your therapist's request, did you not?"

John thought about the few posts – if they could be called that – on his blog. Each was a matter of sentences long at best, put up there with the sole purpose of pleasing his therapist, without really containing anything of importance. "Well, yeah," he said, "but it's not like I've posted much."

Sherlock grinned, and he pushed the laptop in John's direction, standing so that John could take his seat. "Maybe you should start," he said. "You are, for all intents and purposes, my associate. Perhaps your audience would be interested in the details of our most recent case."

"You mean the case where we tracked a vampire hunter?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Obviously, you're going to leave a few details out. Just expand on the story you told your employer. Perhaps if you mention that we discovered that someone by the name of Moriarty is associated with the organisation we have been investigating, it might draw his attention. It might just encourage him to make his next move."

John slid into the seat that Sherlock had been occupying moments ago. "Why don't you post it on your blog?" he asked.

"I hardly have time to do something like that," Sherlock replied. "And besides, I've never bothered writing extensive case notes. Doing so now would arouse suspicion."

" _I've_ never written case notes."

"Yes, but for all they know, this is the first time you've had case notes to write. You're too new to this for it to be noted as unusual."

John sighed, but he logged into his blog as Sherlock asked, opening up a new post and staring at the screen. The cursor blinked in the textbook. "God," he said, "where do I even start?"

Sherlock stood, checking his phone before pocketing it again. "I'll go home and collect my laptop," he said, which did not help John work out how to start a post, "and then I can come back and see what else I can find."

John turned away from the laptop screen, looking over his shoulder. "You don't need to come back here, you know," he said quietly after a pause.

Sherlock stopped on his way to the door and frowned, glancing back over at John. "Wouldn't you prefer it if someone was present to make sure you're all right?"

John smiled wryly. "I've had worse injuries than this, I can handle it. You're going to get cabin fever if you stay here with me. You know you don't have to, right?"

"Of course I know that," Sherlock said quickly, and John shook his head.

"Really, I mean it. You don't need to do anything to make up for what happened, so if the reason you're planning on working in here is because you think you need to apologise or make sure that I'm okay or whatever, it's fine. You don't have to. Let's face it: I'm not going to be much help until my side heals anyway."

Sherlock was quiet for a moment, before he said, "I'd have more luck working on this at my flat. Are you sure..."

"I'm not going to tear my stitches out walking around my flat without supervision," John interrupted. "Trust me. You can go get some work done, and you can text me if you find anything."

Sherlock seemed to hesitate for a moment longer, but then he nodded his head. "I'll contact you if I find anything," he promised. "Are you..."

"You're hovering," John said, cutting him off again. "I'm fine. I'll just finish off this blog post."

Sherlock nodded once more. "Contact me if anything happens," he said, and then he turned and made his way out the door.

OoO

The next few days passed slowly, and for the most part uneventfully. John wrote up the blog post, as he told Sherlock he would. He took his time doing it, wanting to make it as accurate as possible (with the exception of a few minor details, of course). He wrote it out completely truthfully at first, and then went through when he edited it to change any word that suggested any sort of less-believable element to the story. He proofread it twice more before posting it, just to make sure he hadn't missed anything, and then he shut down his laptop and turned in for an early night.

The following morning, there were three missed calls on his phone. Two were from Harry, each with a voicemail message containing a number of slurred profanities expressing her disbelief about what had happened. (At least, that was what the first voicemail message contained; the second was barely coherent). The final missed call was from Ella, his therapist, politely requesting that he call her back as soon as possible to organise an appointment to discuss his most recent post.

There were also, to John's surprise, a couple of comments on his post, mostly saying the same things that Harry had said in her voicemail message (albeit more coherently). One comment was from Mike Stamford, who said that he hadn't known until now that John knew Sherlock, and that he would not have believed a word of the story if he did not know the both of them. (John wondered how well Mike really knew Sherlock, all things considered). There was also a comment from Bill Murray, simply saying how amazing the story itself was. Finally, there was a comment from Sherlock himself which could only be read in a condescending tone, discussing how John had romanticised what he considered to be an exact science.

John got as far as typing out a comment in response, telling Sherlock that if he wanted to show off his intelligence he should have written out case notes on his own blog, before realising that Sherlock had probably put the comment there to help guide whoever was watching them to John's blog. He deleted his half-written comment and made himself a cup of tea.

OoO

Aside from the comment, John did not hear from Sherlock for the next few days. He considered texting a couple of times to ask how the case was coming along, but he got no further than picking up his phone before he decided that Sherlock would not want and did not need the distraction. If there had been any news, Sherlock would have contacted him.

Four days after John had been sent home, a black car pulled up outside his bedsit. He recognised the man who came to the door as one of Mycroft's employees; although he would have known that the man was associated with Mycroft from the sight of the car alone. The man informed him that John was to come back to Mycroft's estate so that Hannah could reassess his injury, and John came willingly, eager to no longer be confined to the small space of his bedsit. He was hardly even bothered by the smell of vampire the moment he walked through the front door.

He was healing well, and his stitches came out. Hannah told him that he would have to take it easy still – nothing too strenuous, no heavy lifting – but she did say that he was allowed to go back to work. It was a relief to hear it. He needed the money, and he needed something to do while he was waiting for something, anything, to happen regarding the organisation. Sherlock was busy, but for the moment being there was nothing John could do to keep himself occupied.

He called Sarah that afternoon to tell her that he was doing better, and he was rostered on for work the following week. At least for a while, there was nothing he could do to help Sherlock, and so, at least for a while, his life returned to normal.

That is, as normal as life can be for a werewolf.


	37. Chapter 37

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year! I hope 2016 has been good for you all so far.
> 
> Many thanks to my absolutely phenomenal beta, Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for all her help (as well as for screaming with me after the release of the special because oh my god that was an amazing episode).

John's blog had an unexpected amount of traffic.

That wasn't to say that John's blog had an extremely large amount of traffic – nothing compared to the hundreds upon thousands of views that some particularly famous weblogs and other pages get – but Sherlock had had low expectations. After all, John was nothing special. Well, he was, but in ways that were not publicised on the internet. John was not a famous person, not someone whom others would be actively searching for online, and even with the handful of regular viewers of Sherlock's own website who may have gone over to John's blog following Sherlock's comment, Sherlock had expected only a few page views in total. Needless to say, he was surprised when he found that, no more than a week after the post had been put up, it had raked in a good hundred or so views.

(It had raked in more views than the average post on Sherlock's own website, though Sherlock would insist that he did not care about that. Besides, the things on his website were far more complicated, so it came as no surprise that they would interest a smaller number of more intelligent people who were capable of comprehending the information there.)

It was entirely possible that one, if not more, of the visitors to John's website was related to the organisation. It was even a possibility that one of them might have been this Moriarty person himself. However, Sherlock did not expect to be able to find him very easily through the traffic counters on John's blog alone. Finding basic information on the visitors to one's website was all too easy – simply logging into John's blog (taking approximately 48 seconds to figure out the password) gave him access to not only the traffic counter but also to statistics regarding the regions of the world from which the blog's visitors came, the web browsers they used, whether they had found John's blog directly or through referring URLs or keyword searches, and so on. It offered all the information that a blogger would desire to understand their audience and tailor their posts appropriately, just at the click of a button. Surely, therefore, Moriarty and other members of the organisation would know better than to allow their electronic movements to be easily traced. The man had successfully hidden himself from all the databases that Sherlock could think to search for him on, which implied that he, or someone in the organisation, had a certain level of technological skill. To a person like that, making it difficult for anyone to trace a visit to a blog would not be a challenge.

It was interesting to have a look at the statistics on John's blog nonetheless. Well, it was interesting in a relative sense; it was more interesting than doing nothing while waiting for Moriarty to make his next move. Most of the visitors to John's blog were from England, presumably from London. Many of these people were likely connected to John, if not directly (like the small handful that had commented on John's post shortly after it had been uploaded) then by only a degree or two – friends of John's friends, for instance. Some of the visitors were from outside of England. Some were from Afghanistan, likely also connected to John immediately or by a degree, others from America and even a couple from Australia who were most likely had no idea who John was at all but had found his blog through keyword searches.

Sherlock was already aware that the organisation spread far beyond England. Perhaps some of these visitors were members themselves. Perhaps some of the visitors had been alerted to John's blog through searches related to the organisation itself. If the organisation were big enough, it would not be unexpected that there would be members charged with the responsibilities of ensuring the organisation's secrets stay secret and were thus not revealed online.

Sherlock himself kept an eye on the traffic on John's blog, and especially the comments, over the next few days. He could dismiss the comments that had accounts attached to them – those people were too easy to trace, and Moriarty surely would not do the same – but there was a small handful of anonymous comments that he read over. It was entirely possible that one of them was a member of the organisation. It was entirely possible that one of them was Moriarty himself.

However, none of the comments gave any indication as to what would be Moriarty's next move. None of them gave any indication that they were related to the organisation. "is this real?", read one of them. "Oh, I do love a good puzzle." read another. None of them made Sherlock feel like he was any closer to finding Moriarty. With every day that passed, Sherlock began to feel like perhaps they had failed to grab Moriarty's attention with the blog post, and they would need to find another way to lure him out.

That was, at least, until 221 Baker Street had a break-in.

OoO

It happened a good couple of weeks after the blog post had first gone online. Sherlock returned from a visit to St Bart's one afternoon, and as he reached for the door handle, he noticed a number of scratch marks beneath the lock.

221B had been around for a long while, and the door was in need of a fresh coat of paint. There were marks over it, scratch marks and paint chips, and there had been scratch marks beneath the keyhole from the day that Sherlock had moved in. It was a common place for such marks, beneath the lock on the door – there were marks from when one of the flat's previous occupants had come home drunk and had missed the keyhole the first couple of times they had tried to insert the key, or marks from Mrs Hudson after she had picked up some groceries and was attempting to insert the key while being weighed down by too many bags. Even Sherlock had left marks a couple of times, when he had left feeding a little later than he should have and was struggling to see straight. Sherlock knew this flat and he knew this door; he knew the marks upon it.

So, Sherlock knew the moment that he stepped up to unlock the door that the marks beneath the keyhole were new. He crouched down to study them at eye level, brushing a finger over them to feel their depth. They were not the same width as the marks that had been left by the various occupants of the flat, and they were a bit deeper, implying that they were not made with the same key. These marks were made by something sharper, something thinner.

They were made by something designed to unlock a door without the use of a key.

"Mrs Hudson!" Sherlock yelled, pushing the door open hurriedly and stumbling inside. "Mrs Hudson!"

"Sherlock?" came Mrs Hudson's voice, and Sherlock followed the sound into his landlady's flat, finding the woman in question in her kitchen surrounded by several bags of groceries. There were no visible injuries on her body, and the confused but otherwise calm expression on her face gave no indication that anything untoward had happened to her, much to Sherlock's relief. He immediately turned to leave, and behind him he heard her prompt, "Whatever's the matter?"

"We've had a break-in," he replied over his shoulder, and he heard Mrs Hudson gasp.

"What?" she asked, and Sherlock heard footsteps as she scurried after him.

He replied without breaking his stride, heading towards the stairs and then taking them two at a time. "Scratch marks under the keyhole," he said. "They're from a lock pick." He pushed open the door to the sitting room when he reached the landing and stepped inside. He could hear Mrs Hudson making her way up the stairs behind him, but he tuned her out, putting the world on mute temporarily. His eyes scanned the room, comparing it with the last image he had of it stored in his Mind Palace and searching for anything that had changed, anything that was out of place. There was nothing, no evidence that anything had been moved or even touched.

He darted into his bedroom next, ignoring Mrs Hudson's attempts to get him to explain to her what was going on, and he did the same thing there, scanning the room for any changes. He rarely used his bedroom – he did not need to sleep, and the sitting room provided more than enough space for him to work, so scanning his own room took only a matter of seconds. There was very little in there that could have been moved, and none of it had.

He turned around, striding over to Mrs Hudson and grabbing her by the arms suddenly, making her start. "Is anything from your flat missing?" he asked, and she frowned, worrying her bottom lip.

"I... I'm not sure, let me go check," she said, stepping away from him and heading back down the stairs to her own flat. Sherlock stayed upstairs, stepping further into the sitting room to get a better look at it all and to see if there was anything that he had missed, but nothing caught his attention. He wondered if, someone had broken in not to steal something but to gather the information that Sherlock had on the organisation, information that he had been keeping in the flat because it seemed safer than having it on a device that had access to the internet. However, the papers on the desk had not been moved; if anyone had come for information, they would have only gotten the small amount that was visible on the top of the pile and nothing more.

If nothing had been taken from Sherlock's flat, it must have been Mrs Hudson's flat that they were interested in. Why would that be? Mrs Hudson did not have anything particularly valuable. Valuable to her, certainly – photographs and other trinkets that held memories – but little of monetary value that would have been of any interest to a thief. Mrs Hudson was something of a minimalist; the way in which she decorated her flat was based on practicality – what would make it easiest to dust? She did not have a car, so they could not have come in to steal keys. They could have come to steal cash, but surely breaking into a flat to steal the small amount of money that someone like Mrs Hudson would keep lying around would be more effort than it was worth, wouldn't it?

Sherlock turned and rushed down the stairs. He turned to head into Mrs Hudson's flat, to find out what had been taken from her, and then hesitated, glancing over at the staircase leading to the floor below. There was one other possibility.

He took the last flight of stairs, reaching the door to the basement flat, 221C, and he crouched down to the keyhole.

There were scratch marks. Just like the ones on the front door.

"Mrs Hudson!" he yelled, making his way back up the stairs and meeting her at the top.

"I can't see anything missing," she began, glancing back over her shoulder to her own flat, but Sherlock all but cut her off.

"Has anyone been in 221C?"

"No. I can't get anyone interested in it. That's the curse of basements."

"Someone broke in."

Mrs Hudson's brow furrowed in confusion. "They can't have. There's nothing in there. What reason would anyone have to break in?"

"Open the door and we'll find out."

Though the frown did not disappear from her face, Mrs Hudson turned and headed back up into her flat, emerging again a moment later with her keys. She fiddled with them as she followed Sherlock down to 221C, muttering something about the damp. Sherlock, for the most part, had tuned her out again, staring intently at the lock on the door and the scratch marks beneath it.

Mrs Hudson found the key she was looking for and reached down to insert it into the lock, but then Sherlock's hand shot out and grabbed her wrist, making her start once again.

"What is it?" she asked.

The scratch marks beneath the lock on this door were just like the ones beneath the lock on the front door.

They were _exactly_ like the marks on the front door.

"They're intentional," Sherlock said. "Whoever made them wanted us— wanted me to find them."

Mrs Hudson frowned and hesitated. "What if it's dangerous?" she asked, dropping her tone to a hushed whisper. "Maybe I should call the police."

"No," Sherlock replied. The police would take too long to get here; if there was the potential for whatever was behind that door to have some sort of time limit associated with it, they needed to open it now. If it was a trap – well, then they would just have to be ready to act.

Body tense and ready to move, Sherlock released Mrs Hudson's wrist and gestured to her to unlock the door. She hesitated for a moment longer, but when she met Sherlock's eyes her expression became resolute. She trusted Sherlock. If Sherlock was telling her to open the door, she was going to trust that he knew what he was doing.

She slid the key into the lock, turned it, and pushed the door open.

Nothing immediately jumped out at them, figuratively or literally. The flat seemed as quiet inside as it had been outside, and just as empty as a vacant flat could be expected to be. Sherlock exchanged glances with Mrs Hudson, frowning. This made even less sense than the idea that the perpetrator, whoever they may be, had broken into either Sherlock's or Mrs Hudson's flat and had taken nothing.

Sherlock took a quiet, cautious step into the flat, and then another, wary of anything that might be lurking unseen, anything that might reveal why someone had broken into the empty basement flat on Baker Street.

He did not have to go more than two steps into the room to see it.

Whoever had broken into the flat had not done so to take anything, as most do. They had broken into the flat to leave something behind.

There, sitting in the centre of the living room in an otherwise empty flat, was a pair of shoes.


	38. Chapter 38

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for all of her help.

The shoes were old and worn and falling apart. They were high top sneakers with laces criss-crossed from the toe to the ankle, made from canvas and rubber. They might have been black once upon a time, but the colour had faded, as had the logo on the side. They did not spontaneously combust when Sherlock touched them. He had not really thought they would – a bomb would surely have more noticeable wires, noticeable at least to Sherlock's keen eye – but he had been wary when he approached them nonetheless. It didn't make sense to him, why someone would break into his building, leaving noticeable marks to make sure Sherlock followed the trail, to find nothing but a pair of shoes. The only thing that made sense was the idea that the shoes were in some way a trap.

However, if it was a trap, it was not one designed to kill Sherlock or Mrs Hudson on the spot. Sherlock picked up one of the shoes (making sure to wear gloves, on the off chance that they could discover anything through fingerprint analysis), twisting it around and turning it upside down. It did not blow up, nor did anything fall out. It looked like a perfectly normal, well-worn shoe that had absolutely no place being in a vacant flat.

"Why would someone leave their shoes?" Mrs Hudson asked behind him.

Sherlock peered inside the shoe, looking for anything written on the sole.

_Oh, I do love a good puzzle_ , said one of the anonymous comments on John's blog.

"The curtain rises," Sherlock murmured under his breath.

"What was that?" Mrs Hudson asked. "What is it?"

"I think it's a puzzle for me."

OoO

Sherlock took the shoes to St Bart's, in case there was anything there that could not be seen by the naked eye. He checked beneath the inner soles of the shoes, in case they were being used to carry something else – drugs, perhaps – but there was nothing there but dirt. He studied the wear on the bottoms, the markings on the inside of the shoe, the fraying at the end of the laces, but it was not apparent to him exactly what he was looking for. A puzzle was easy to solve when you know, at least in some sense, the shape of the solution – you might not know exactly what it is, but you know that you need to put the pieces together to make a shape, or you know that you need to find a way in which several clues fit together to form a whole. You don't know what the solution is, but you have some idea of the direction in which you need to work in order to find it.

Unfortunately, Sherlock did not have the slightest clue what he was looking for to solve the puzzle of the shoes. Did he need to determine who had owned the shoes once upon a time? Was there a clue hidden in the lines of dirt on the bottom and the faded words on the inner soles?

The shoes were old and well-worn, to start with. There was more wear on the insides, suggesting the owner had weak arches. Effort had clearly been put in to keep the shoes in good condition when they were being worn; the owner had tried to keep them clean, and there was evidence that the laces had been changed multiple times. Under the microscope, on the laces, there were traces of flaky skin – the owner must have suffered from a condition such as eczema.

They were fairly large, certainly bigger than the average child's foot, but traces of ink on the inner soles suggested someone's name had once been written there, and adults did not write their names on the inside of their shoes. There was still dirt on the soles, but it was not fresh; it fell away easily if Sherlock touched it or tilted the shoe in the right way. Someone had clearly put a lot of effort into preserving these shoes, to make them look as though they had been worn – and dirtied – recently, but it was clear from the way that the tops of the shoes caved in that it had been a long time since they had been stretched by anybody's feet.

Sherlock studied the logo on the side of the shoe – or, at least, what he could make out of it, as most of it had faded. This style of shoes had drifted in and out of fashion for as long as Sherlock could remember. Most trends seemed to do that, though that was hardly something he frequently paid attention to. He had noted that this particular style of shoe had come back into fashion in recent years, popularised by some brand called Discourse or Converse or something that had equally little to do with shoes. However, Sherlock had seen this style long before the teenagers wearing them now had even been alive. In fact, Sherlock could remember seeing this style of shoe when it was first introduced. They had been designed by a company called Keds; they were the first real sneakers to have been invented, replacing the plimsole excuses for shoes that were used for running in the 1800s that provided no comfort whatsoever –

Oh.

_Oh_.

A light bulb turned on in one of the rooms in his Mind Palace, casting light over a room that had not been entered in a long time, over faded newspaper articles and puddles of water and, right in the middle, a pair of shoes.

Sherlock scampered to his feet, shoving the shoes into a plastic bag and racing out the door, down the stairs (almost knocking over Molly Hooper and her cup of coffee in the process) and out into the street.

John would be at work at this time of day. The surgery was not far from St. Bart's; it took less than five minutes to get there by cab. Sherlock scarcely gave the cab time to come to a complete stop before he leapt out, shouting over his shoulder to the driver to wait for him before running through the sliding doors of the surgery.

John, it seemed, was on his lunch break, as he was not in his office. Instead, he was leaning against the front desk, talking to the young, blonde woman behind it. Both of them glanced up as Sherlock rushed through. The blonde woman looked confused, John looked slightly alarmed.

"John!" Sherlock said, holding up the bag containing the shoes. This, of course, did not clarify anything for John regarding why Sherlock had rushed into the surgery during his lunch hour, but he did seem to gather the urgency of the situation. He pushed himself off the desk, glancing over at the woman there.

"Sorry, Mary," Sherlock heard him say before his attention returned to Sherlock. He nodded his head in the direction of his office. "Come on."

Sherlock followed John into his office, and John closed the door behind them before he turned to Sherlock. He glanced towards the bag in Sherlock's hands. "What's happened?"

Sherlock put the bag down on John's desk, retrieving one of the plastic gloves from box on the shelf before he opened the bag, pulling out one of the shoes to show it to John. "These were in the basement flat in my building," he said.

This did not shed any more light on the situation for John. Instead, it just seemed to make him more confused, judging by the way his brow furrowed. "Shoes," he stated. "You rushed in here like something was on fire because you found a pair of shoes."

Sherlock made a frustrated sound. "Not just any pair of shoes," he said. "I think they belonged to Carl Powers."

"Carl Powers," John repeated (Sherlock tried not to get too irritated by the redundancy). "Who's Carl Powers?"

"He was a child, a swimmer. A few years after I was turned, they found his body face down in a river. It looked like he had gone for a swim and had had some sort of fit in the water. It was too late by the time they found him. They dismissed it as nothing more than a tragic accident."

"But you thought differently?" John prompted, and Sherlock nodded his head.

"They found all his clothes a little way upstream, everything but his shoes. I knew there was something suspicious about that, but no one else seemed to care. I couldn't do much, given my... state, so the police would not listen to me and nothing ever came of it. His shoes didn't turn up." He glanced down at the shoe in his hand, and added, "Until now."

"Okay," John said slowly, clearly trying to piece this all together in his head. "So you think he was murdered, then? And the killer kept his shoes for all these years? Why would they do that?"

"Perhaps it was a souvenir," Sherlock suggested. "Or perhaps this was all part of a larger plan. Perhaps they knew that I had been interested in the case and knew that someday they would want to get my attention like this."

"That's a very long-term plan, if this kid drowned when you were a newborn vampire."

Sherlock looked up at John, his eyes bright. "That's the most interesting part," he said. "The implication is that Powers' killer has been around for at least as long as I have, if not longer. Our stories have been entwined for far longer than I have been aware."

"And you think it's him, then?" John asked. "Moriarty?"

"Could be. It seems likely, doesn't it, given the timing? You make a post designed to get Moriarty's attention, and a matter of days later, a pair of shoes that have been missing from the scene of a murder over a hundred years ago turns up. I highly doubt that is a coincidence."

"Okay," John says. "So what do we do now?"

"We solve his puzzle," Sherlock replied, putting the shoes back into the bag. "We work out exactly how Carl Powers was killed. The answer has to be somewhere on these shoes, else they wouldn't have been given to us. We'll take them back to the flat and see if we can see – "

"Sherlock," John said, cutting him off. "I'm still working, you realise."

Sherlock looked up and frowned. "We have a case," he said. "Surely that's more important than your part-time job."

"We're not going to have this conversation again, are we?" John replied. "Look, my shift finishes in a few hours. How about I go straight to your flat when I'm done? You're kind of the brains of this operation; you don't really need me around right now, do you?"

"No, I don't, but an outside eye, a second opinion can be very useful to me. Besides, you were the one who insisted on being a part of this investigation."

"Yes, I did, and I am, just not during the hours when I'm getting paid to be here. I'll be with you as soon as my shift finishes, yeah?"

Sherlock purses his lips, but he nods his head. "Very well," he said. "I'll go see what I can find."

"Good lad." John stepped past him to open the door, gesturing to Sherlock to go out first and then following him out. "I'll see you this afternoon."

Sherlock nodded his head, glancing over towards the woman John had called Mary, who had clearly been waiting for John to return, and then he returned his gaze to the front again, heading out the door. Behind him, he heard Mary say, "What was that all about? Who was that?"

"Friend of mine," he heard John say in response. "We've just been looking into something together."

"Oh, he's the detective, isn't he?" Mary replied. "The one you said you'd been working with."

John might have said something in response, but at that point, Sherlock stepped out through the doors, and out of hearing range.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made sure to do my research for this chapter. Plimsole shoes were 'sport shoes' in the early 1800s made from canvas and rubber, and Wikipedia tells me that running with them on is "not dissimilar to running without shoes". Keds released a more comfortable pair of sneakers in 1892. I based my description of these shoes off an old-fashioned advertisement for Keds that I found online, which I accept may not have been the most reliable piece of information, so any mistakes made are my own.


	39. Chapter 39

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for being the most brilliant beta ever to exist and for continuously having the best responses to every chapter I send. Also a shout out to the few of you who have taken time to comment on the past few chapters - it means the world.

Come the end of his shift, John packed up his things and made his way straight to Baker Street, as he had promised. Sherlock didn't need him, not really – John had seen his brain in action, knew he was more than capable of solving everything about this organisation by himself if it came to that – but John had asked (insisted, really) that he be a part of this investigation, and he couldn't just pick and choose when he wanted to help. This case, for Sherlock, had become a full time job, and though John had said many times that he would do this alongside his work as a doctor, he needed to be committed to the investigation as much as he could. He was in this now and he couldn't get out, especially not when you took into consideration the fact that, whether he liked it or not, John was going to be a target of this organisation as long as they knew what he was. It was in his best interest, as well as Sherlock's, to make sure that they did not have to go through every day in fear that they would end up with a bullet, wooden or silver, through their hearts.

Committing to the investigation and going straight to Baker Street at the end of the day did mean, unfortunately, that John had to reject an offer from their newest receptionist to go out for coffee, which was a bit of a disappointment. Mary had started work at the practice during the few days that John was recovering from his injury, and John had quickly taken a liking to her when he had come back. She was nice, friendly. And pretty. And she had taken an interest in him, too, especially after his blog post had somehow made its way around the practice. John wasn't one to show off, but Mary's interest in the small part he played in the work of Sherlock Holmes was not unwelcome. It was a shame that he had to say no to her offer, though he hoped that it was something that could be rescheduled rather than cancelled altogether.

Sherlock better appreciate John's help, he found himself thinking.

He paid the driver and climbed out of the cab when it reached Sherlock's address, heading up to the door and ringing the doorbell. With the amount of time he spent here, it was beginning to seem like it was about time he had a key for himself. It took a good minute and a half (and five rings of the bell) for anyone to come and let him in, and, typically, it was Mrs Hudson and not Sherlock himself. She apologised for taking so long to open the door, muttered something fondly about not being his housekeeper, 'but you wouldn't know it, what, with the things I do for him', and then gestured for John to head upstairs.

John found Sherlock sitting at his dining table, staring down into the eyepiece of his microscope. One of the shoes was sitting on the table beside him; John almost commented on how unhygienic that was before remembering that Sherlock had no reason to use the table to eat. Sherlock did not look up when John entered the room.

"Find anything?" John asked.

No response.

"Not yet?" he prompted.

No response.

"Can I do anything?"

No response.

"Can I help? I want to help."

Nothing.

John stood there for a moment in case Sherlock snapped out of his state and decided to acknowledge John's existence, but he had no such luck. "Right," he said, finding himself wishing he had taken Mary up on her offer after all. "I'll just... make myself at home, then, shall I?"

He got as much of a response to that as he had gotten to any of his earlier questions, so after a moment, he sighed, and then squeezed in between the kitchen bench and Sherlock's chair so that he could get to the kettle. If Sherlock wasn't answering his questions, there was really no point in asking if he minded if John made himself something to drink. Besides, anything in the fridge that was not blood was likely going to go to waste anyway, and it was a shame that Mrs Hudson was wasting her money buying groceries for a man who had no need for them.

John took out one of the mugs as he waited for the kettle to boil. He put it down on the counter, and then noticed a red stain on the inside and grimaced, moving it to the sink and taking another one. He looked extra closely at this one for any lingering bloodstains, making a mental note to consider bringing over one of his own mugs – one that had never had blood in it – but he decided that this one looked clean enough for now. He would avoid it in future, to avoid any odd tastes in his tea.

The kettle boiled and he poured himself a cup of tea, pleased to discover that the milk in the fridge did not smell off or like it had been spiked with anything toxic and was therefore drinkable as well. He stirred it in, and then glanced over his shoulder at Sherlock. The man hardly looked as though he had moved since John had arrived at his flat. In fact, John could not even see a rise and fall of his chest. What would that be like, not needing to breathe? John had noticed Sherlock breathed slowly when they were out in public, likely to keep up appearances, but it seemed he had no such concerns when John was the only one around. He wondered how difficult that was for Sherlock to do, to breathe without the instinct there. Had it taken Sherlock a while to learn how to control his breathing in order to pass as human?

Sherlock remained silent and still for a good couple of minutes, while John blew on his tea and watched the vampire stare intently down the eyepiece of the microscope. John was about to ask if there was something he could do that would make him a little bit more useful than sitting here watching Sherlock do all the work, when Sherlock finally spoke.

"Poison," he said, under his breath.

"What?" John prompted, to make sure he heard correctly, and then Sherlock broke his stillness so suddenly he made John start. He slammed his hands down on the dining table.

"Clostridium botulinum!" he proclaimed. "It's one of the deadliest poisons on the planet."

"So you were right, then?" John said. "He was murdered."

"Well, obviously. I never doubted that. It was just a case of working out precisely how it was done."

"Which was poison."

Sherlock nodded. "He suffered from eczema. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to add the poison to whatever medication or balm he was using for it. He got in the water, the poison took effect, paralysed the muscles, and he drowned. There are still tiny traces of it on the inside of the shoes from where he put the cream on his feet."

"But if he was poisoned, how come the autopsy didn't pick that up?"

"It's virtually undetectable, and regardless, nobody would have been looking for it. Clostridium botulinum was only discovered in the late 1800s; it could not have been discovered long before Carl Power's murder. Moriarty, or whoever was responsible for Power's death, must have had contacts and must have put a lot of effort into staying up to date in this area."

"So he's an expert in methods of murder?"

Sherlock said nothing, but his lips pulled into a smirk.

"So what do we do with this information?" John asked after a beat. "Should we call Lestrade?"

"And tell him that the police failed to solve a murder that occurred over a hundred years ago? No, there's no point in doing that. We need to get Moriarty's attention, prove to him that we've solved his puzzle."

"And how are we going to do that?"

Rather than answering, Sherlock stood up, locating his laptop in the sitting room and bringing it back over to the kitchen table. He pushed the microscope out of the way to make room, and John stood up so he could look over Sherlock's shoulder at what he was doing. He watched as Sherlock opened up his website, going straight onto the forum and making a post.

'FOUND! Pair of shoes belonging to Carl Powers (1886-1897). Botulinum toxin still present. Apply 221b Baker St.'

He posted the message onto the forum, and then looked back at John.

"Do you think that's enough?" John asked, nodding towards the laptop. "To get his attention, I mean."

"Your post seemed to be enough. If he's watching your blog, he's probably watching mine too."

"What's going to happen when he works out we've solved it? Send us another puzzle?"

A smile grew over Sherlock's face, his eyes almost dangerously bright. "I believe we'll soon find out."

OoO

Sherlock was right; the forum post was enough to get somebody's attention. Their next puzzle arrived two days later, when they were called in by Lestrade to consult on a case. Well, more correctly, when Sherlock called Lestrade and demanded to be put on a case. A hired car was found abandoned in an open field, the interior coated with blood. The reason why Sherlock insisted on being put on the case, the reason why Sherlock knew that it was related, was because a business card for a car hire company known as Janus Cars had been slipped through the mail shoot at 221B that morning. A coincidence was highly unlikely.

The man who had hired the car was a banker known as Ian Monkford; the blood on the inside of the car matched his DNA. He had been going on a business trip – or, at least, that was what his wife claimed to believe. He had never arrived. There was also no sign of the body, though Lestrade firmly believed that it would turn up. Any wound that had caused that amount of blood to be left in the vehicle should have left some sort of trail of evidence to follow.

Sherlock disagreed.

A conversation with Monkford's tearful wife revealed that her husband's disappearance had not come as a surprise, as she was leading the police to believe. When Sherlock started referring to her husband in past tense, she joined in; anyone who was truly surprised, shocked about their husband's disappearance would still be holding onto hope and using present tense out of habit, especially given the fact that Monkford's body had yet to be found. John assumed that that implied she was the murderer, though Sherlock informed him that a murderer would not make such a careless mistake.

Their next stop was Janus Cars, for a conversation with the owner of the company, Mr Ewert. After that, Sherlock had all the pieces needed to solve the puzzle; it hardly took a few hours. There had been exactly a pint of blood in the car, which meant that it had not come from an injury, but had been taken earlier and frozen, spread over the seats to make it look like Monkford had been injured. Monkford, therefore, had not been murdered, but had wanted to make it seem like he had, obviously so that he could get away. Mr Ewert's tan line, as well as the spot on his arm he kept scratching at – undoubtedly from a booster jab – confirmed this. Ewert had helped Monkford move; it was another service that Janus Cars offered, to help their clients disappear, to run away from trouble. Monkford had been helped out of the country, and Ewert and Mrs Monkford split his life insurance. Working out to where Ian Monkford had vanished was easy: Ewert had had a twenty thousand Colombian peso note in his wallet.

Sherlock gave all this information to Lestrade, so that Lestrade could go off and arrest Mr Ewert and Mrs Monkford. What he did not give Lestrade was Ian Monkford's motivation for disappearing. He dismissed it as unimportant, explaining that it was likely that Monkford was in some sort of financial trouble as a banker. The truth was far more interesting, but not something that Lestrade would, or could, understand.

Sherlock explained it to John when they both got back to the flat that afternoon, when they were out of ear shot of anyone who could be interested. He had noticed it the moment he had seen the car, he explained – the blood had had a slightly unusual smell. It had not been something that anyone with a more average sense of smell would have picked up, although he was surprised (and, John thought, he seemed a bit disappointed) that John had failed to do so. The DNA test would not have picked it up, but all the same, the blood coating the car's interior had not been human blood. It was Ian Monkford's, without a doubt, but it was blood that had once belonged to someone else, blood that had flowed down the throat and through the veins of a vampire.

It was impossible to tell from the smell of the blood alone how long ago Monkford had been turned. Perhaps it was recent, and he had felt the need to get away from London, away from whomever had turned him, as quickly as possible. Perhaps, more likely, it had been some time ago, and it was time for Monkford to start anew. Humans can be marvellously oblivious at times, unexpectedly dismissive of anything unusual, but eventually, people were bound to notice that someone was not ageing like they should have been. Sherlock had to move every several years for that reason, to get away from anyone who noticed that his appearance had scarcely changed. It seemed it had been time for Ian Monkford to do the same thing.


	40. Chapter 40

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, a million thanks to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for proofreading this for me. Also a shout out to the handful of you who have left comments on the previous few chapters. I love every one of you.

"I'm confused," John said.

"That comes as absolutely no surprise," Sherlock replied.

John looked up from the papers on the desk to glare at the vampire. It had been a few days since the Monkford case. Sherlock had, once again, put something on his forum, to make it clear that they had solved it, but they were yet to be contacted or given another 'puzzle'. Until they did, they had nothing new to work with, no more breadcrumbs to follow.

Then Sherlock had had the idea of working backwards rather than working forwards. Rather than waiting for the next case to come to them, he decided that they could go back through old cases, trying to see if Moriarty or the organisation had played a part in those in some way. Now that they knew that Moriarty had been around for at least as long as Sherlock had, they had to consider cases that occurred up to a hundred years ago; nothing was off-limits.

They had been doing this for the last couple of days. John could not see what Sherlock did in the case files, could not tell what he was looking for to confirm or deny Moriarty's involvement, but Sherlock had found enough to take note of few cases that he saw as suspicious. There was nothing he could be certain of, not when case files were his only source of evidence, but it was a start. It was better than sitting around and waiting.

But this case, this organisation, still did not make sense to John.

"You think Moriarty's a vampire, right?" John asked, choosing to move past the vague insult to his intelligence. Sherlock glanced up at him.

"Well, he could potentially be another creature with an extended lifespan, but given the fact that we know from the bite marks on one of the hunter's necks that a vampire is involved, that does seem most likely."

"There are other creatures with extended lifespans?" John asked, and Sherlock gave him a look that John usually saw him wear when dealing with certain members of Lestrade's team. John made a mental note to look into other non-human species when they did not have more important things to worry about.

"Right," he continued quickly. "Okay, moving on. We know that the organisation consists of hunters."

"Correct," Sherlock said.

"So what do these cases have to do with them?" When Sherlock frowned, looking as though he couldn't see where John was coming from, John elaborated, "I mean, Carl Powers was human, wasn't he? And Ian Monkford wasn't human, but Moriarty or whoever was in his organisation didn't kill him, they helped him get away. That's not what you'd expect hunters to do."

Sherlock leaned his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers against his lips. His expression was thoughtful, for a moment – perhaps he had not considered this in the same way that John had, focussing instead on solving the individual cases rather than working out how they fit into the organisation as a whole. "Perhaps," he began after a moment, "Moriarty is showing us that his influence extends far beyond just hunters. That's all we had been looking at before – cases that involved people like you or me being hunted by humans, but perhaps it goes far further than that. Maybe Moriarty is motivated by money. Maybe he'll do anything if you pay him well enough, whether that is organising someone to kill a vampire or help a vampire escape the country."

John frowned, but he nodded his head slowly. It was logical, though it still didn't quite make sense to him. The cases that they were finding and tying to the organisation seemed almost random, like there was no pattern to them except that there was evidence of Moriarty's involvement. But, perhaps that was all part of the reason why Moriarty had managed to hide himself so well. John turned his attention back down to the papers.

OoO

Their next puzzle came three days later, in the form of a post in Sherlock's forum. The post in question was something that, on any other website, Sherlock would immediately have dismissed as spam. It read "Sad about Connie :(((((", and was posted in the forum in the form of a reply to Sherlock's most recent post (that was, his post regarding Ian Monkford's relocation to Colombia) even though it was completely unrelated to that post in question. Or, at least, it appeared unrelated to that post.

There were a number of reasons why Sherlock did not immediately dismiss the post as spam. For one, the spam filters on his website were generally successful at keeping the forum clear of irrelevant posts. Two, Sherlock was very aware of the fact that the number of people who visited his website was small in comparison to the number who visited other websites, and he knew that his website contained information that would have been of greater interest to those who were marginally more intelligent than the rest of the population (or, at least, those who were not complete idiots, like the majority of the population). It would be unlikely that his website would attract the attention of anyone who would post spam. And, last but most certainly not least, the timing of the post was too close to the other puzzles. A coincidence was highly unlikely.

The first thing Sherlock did was send a text to his brother, somewhat reluctantly asking him for help. Tracking the IP address from which the post had come was not an overly difficult task, but Mycroft was much more equipped with the resources to make that job easier. It ended up being a waste of time, essentially. Moriarty would not be so careless as to make himself easily traceable. The poster had been anonymous, so there were no account details that they had access to, and they could not determine which of the other anonymous posts on both Sherlock's website and John's blog, if any, had come from the same person. The IP address informed them that the post had come from a computer in a public library in London, which gave them only a little bit of information. It could have meant that Moriarty was in London (or, at least, that he had been there a couple of hours earlier when the post had come through), but it also could have meant that someone in Moriarty's apparently vast organisation was there and had been contacted to make the post for him. Really, that gave Sherlock very little information whatsoever.

Mycroft sent him the security footage from the outside of the library, from the time the building opened, and he informed Sherlock that he would send the afternoon's footage after closing time. Sherlock glanced at it briefly, but there were crowds of people, both moving in and out around the library as well as moving through the streets; it would take time to go through all of that. He pushed it aside, making a note to take a proper look at it later, when he had the entire day's footage with him. For now, he could focus his attention on the message.

_Sad about Connie :(((((_. It was a vague message. It could mean anything. Was Connie a person, or the name of a place, or a vehicle, or something else? Was Sherlock supposed to know who, or what, Connie was, know why someone would be sad about them? Was it code? Did Connie stand for something, or represent something? Was there significance in the number of open-parentheses in the emoticon? Was it a clue? It had to be a clue, but what, precisely, was it a clue for?

Connie. It wasn't the most unusual of names, though it wasn't a hugely popular one either. An English name in origin as a girl's name, but with origins in Ireland and Germany as a boy's name. It could be a nickname, too – Constance or Constantina or Conrad or Cornelius or countless other variations. A quick search online revealed a number of social network accounts by various people of the name Connie. Could the anonymous post be referring to any of them? The puzzle would not be an easy one to solve, undoubtedly, and perhaps part of that meant Sherlock needed to search through pages of posts on the internet to find out to whom the post was referring.

Perhaps it wasn't even a name of a person. That was just one of many possibilities. _Connie_ was also a name of a British television show, as well as the name of a character on an American cartoon – and these were only results that were showing up on the first page of Sherlock's web search. Was Connie a celebrity, or an ordinary person using social networking websites, or a fictional character? Or was she none of the above? Perhaps the message had nothing to do with a person called Connie, but was in some way a clue to a crime that Sherlock needed to investigate. Perhaps Connie was a hint that the crime involved, for instance, a con artist.

An extra set of eyes would help, especially if Connie was a person. Sherlock often did not store people's names in his Mind Palace. He did if he expected to interact with them on a regular basis, although even then, he often only stored the part of their name that he used (for instance, he rarely had a need to store the first names of people at the Yard, because he only referred to them as Lestrade or Anderson, and so on). John would know people better than Sherlock knew people, so John's insight on this case could be valuable.

Unfortunately, John was not here. John had been here earlier today, as he had for the past several days while they worked on cracking the case of the organisation together. However, John had left several hours ago. Sherlock had noted his absence when he had requested John pass him a few papers and realised that John was not there to do so, but he could not recall precisely when, or why, he had left. Sherlock frowned in thought, rewinding his memories of the day. What had John said? Something about having a date, or something equally as dull.

Well, whatever John was doing, surely it was significantly less interesting and undoubtedly less important than this case. John knew the importance of this case, so surely he would have his phone on him, and surely he would drop whatever he was doing the moment he made the discovery that there was something better that he could be spending his time on.

Sherlock pulled out his phone and sent off a text.

          We have a new puzzle.  
          SH

When this went unanswered for several minutes (several minutes that were spent scrolling through the social media posts of the first account that came up when the word 'Connie' was searched online, and several minutes that Sherlock concluded were wasted), he sent another.

          What does the name "Connie"  
          mean to you?  
          SH

And another a couple of minutes after that.

          Do you know anyone by the  
          name of Connie?  
          SH

And then another.

          You haven't turned your phone  
          off, surely.  
          SH

And then several more, one after the other.

          What if I had an emergency?  
          SH

          This is an emergency. SH

          "Connie" could be a victim  
          of a crime that has not yet  
          happened. By refusing to  
          acknowledge my texts, you  
          could be putting her life in  
          more danger.  
          SH

(Of course, Sherlock didn't really think that was the case, because that was, from what he had seen, not Moriarty's style, and if Sherlock truly thought that someone was in immediate danger he would not be wasting so much time sending John texts and would be solving the case on his own.)

He followed these texts several minutes later with one more, reading:

          Your date is far duller  
          than this.  
          SH

He pressed send, put his phone down (making sure that he would be able to hear it should John finally get around to replying), and then he returned to working his way through some of the links that came up on his web search.


	41. Chapter 41

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My friends, I have an announcement. As of yesterday, I have, officially, finished this fic. (Insert appropriate celebratory exclamations here). I can now tell you for certain that this fic will have a grand total of 50 chapters. I'm content to continue posting once a week as I have been until it's done, unless you guys would rather me post more frequently. Do please let me know!
> 
> As always, a million thanks to Becca (LlamaWithAPen), without whom this story would be far shorter and more difficult to read.
> 
> Oh, and a quick disclaimer: the website and post mentioned in this chapter are real and belong to the BBC. These words, like any of the quotes you recognise in any of the chapters, are not my own.

It was about forty-five minutes after sending the last text message when Sherlock heard a knock at the door downstairs. Anyone who came for a professional meeting – for instance, potential clients who wanted help with an investigation – used the doorbell, but John consistently knocked, and if you listened closely enough, you could distinguish between sounds made by fists of different sizes. It was easy for Sherlock to tell, therefore, that the person at the door was John. He made no effort to go down and open it, knowing very well that Mrs Hudson would do so, if not straight away then as soon as John got impatient enough to knock again. He heard the door open only a matter of seconds later, as predicted, and he heard footsteps on the stairs (steady, even, completely different to the limping that he had heard in John's stride when they had first become acquainted) before John pushed open the door.

"You took your time," Sherlock said, without looking up from his laptop. Even out of the corner of his eye, however, he could see that the expression on John's face was less than impressed.

"I took my time?" he repeated. "Trust me, I cut my date a lot shorter than it could have been. So, is this as important as your texts say?"

Sherlock hit the keys on his laptop a few times to get to the webpage he wanted, and once he had his forum open again, he turned the laptop around so that John could see the screen. "We have a new puzzle."

John's eyes skimmed over the words quickly, and his brow furrowed. "How do you know that's a puzzle and not just any random person on the internet?"

Sherlock made a dismissive hand gesture. "The timing is far too coincidental," he said. "The universe is rarely so lazy. Now, what do you make of it?"

He watched as John's expression changed, starting as something thoughtful before realisation dawned upon it. "Oh, I think I know," John said, and Sherlock sat up a little straighter.

"What is it?"

"Connie Prince."

"Who?" Sherlock pressed, and John grinned. There was a hint of pride in his expression, and Sherlock didn't blame him. Sherlock himself was just feeling irritated that John was capable of solving a puzzle – or, at least, part of a puzzle – faster than he was.

"You're lucky I've had so much time to watch crap telly," John said, sliding the laptop in front of him and pushing Sherlock's hands away from the keyboard so that he could type. John was a very poor typer, Sherlock noted. Clearly he had never learnt to touch-type; he typed using two fingers, at a speed so slowly that, by the time he had finished a single word, Sherlock was tempted to snatch the laptop back off of him and ask him to read out the website address so that Sherlock could type it himself. However, he held his tongue and waited as patiently as he could manage (which was not very patient, as could be seen by his knee bouncing under the table) as John finally finished typing:

www.connieprince.co.uk

(Sherlock thought to himself that, really, he could have deduced that that was the website address and still have typed it faster than John, but he did not say anything).

John pressed enter, and the webpage loaded quickly. Sherlock saw a frankly alarming combination of pinks and reds all over the screen, and a font that was not at all practical, but before they had the chance to follow any of the links, a message came up on the screen. It read:

Due to the sad untimely death of Ms  
Prince we are no longer accepting  
new members because we are true  
fans of hers who were her friends  
not just in life and not just in death

Sherlock skimmed over the message quickly, and then looked at John. "Who was she?" he demanded. "How did she die?"

"She had a makeover show," John answered. "She was pretty popular, I think. I didn't really follow it but it felt like it was on telly all the time. I think she died of tetanus poisoning, if I'm remembering right. It was only a couple of days ago."

Sherlock slammed his laptop lid shut and stood up quickly. "We need to go to the morgue. I'll text Lestrade and tell him to meet us there."

"You do realise it's almost nine, right?" John said, standing as well. "Who says Lestrade's even on duty?"

"It doesn't matter," Sherlock replied, grabbing his coat and his phone. "If I text, he'll come either way."

OoO

As John had feared, Lestrade was not on duty. As Sherlock had predicted, he came to the morgue anyway, even taking a detour by the Yard, as Sherlock had requested, so that he could get Connie Prince's file. They also managed to intercept Molly Hooper on her way out; it wasn't hard for Sherlock to convince her to delay her dinner a little bit longer while she found a body for them.

Lestrade skimmed through the file that he had brought with him while Molly went through her list to work out what drawer Prince's body was in. "Connie Prince," he read. "Fifty-four. Had one of those makeover shows on the telly, did you see it?"

"No," Sherlock said shortly.

"Very popular. She was going places." He cleared his throat. "Cause of death was tetanus poisoning. She cut her hand on a rusty nail in the garden."

Sherlock could see the mark that the nail had left; there was a scratch between her thumb and index finger on her right hand. He pulled his magnifying glass out of his pocket, studying it for a moment, before moving his gaze over her body, moving the magnifying glass with him. There were tiny spots over her face – pinpricks, they looked like – as well as scratches on her arms. They looked like claw marks; it seemed likely that Connie Prince owned a cat.

"Something's wrong with this picture," Sherlock murmured, more to himself than anything else. Lestrade looked up at him with a frown.

"What makes you say that?"

"It can't be as simple as it seems, else our attention would not have been directed towards it. We're missing something."

"Yeah, why _is_ he doing this, sending you puzzles?" Lestrade asked. Sherlock ignored him, returning his attention to the cut on the woman's hand.

"John," he said after a moment. "The cut on her hand, it's deep. It would have bled a lot, right?"

"Yeah," John said slowly, stepping over to the body to get a better look.

"But the wound's clean – very clean, and fresh. How long would the bacteria have been incubating inside of her?"

"Eight, ten days," John said, and then realisation came over his face, and he added, "The cut was made later."

Sherlock suppressed a grin. John was learning. Good.

"The question is, then, how did the bacteria enter her system?" Sherlock said, scanning over the body again. He glanced up at Lestrade, and, noticing that his attention had temporarily been occupied by Molly Hooper, he turned back to John and lowered his voice. "There's something else," he said, and he cautiously brushed a few strands of the woman's short hair out of the way.

There, on her neck, were two more spots, these only slightly deeper and slightly larger than the pinprick-sized spots covering her face. An untrained eye would not see a difference, but Sherlock knew better. So, it appeared, did John.

"Bite marks?" he asked, dropping his voice to a hushed tone. Sherlock nodded his head.

"I think we have a couple of puzzles that we need to solve here."

OoO

Ideally, the next step would have been for John to go to visit Connie's house – where her brother, Kenny Prince, was now living by himself. However, it was too late at night to take that step, and so it would have to wait until morning. Instead, John went home for the night, and Sherlock went back to Baker Street. He had another lead to follow. At least, he had a lead to follow regarding one part of the investigation. He had a suspicion as to how the poison had gotten into Connie Prince's body. Where – or, more precisely, who the bite marks had come from was another, arguably more interesting matter.

A possible explanation would have been that whoever had fed from Connie had taken too much, and then had used the tetanus poisoning story to hide their involvement. However, that was far too complicated; not only would they have needed to make the scratch, but to somehow get the poison into her body, and to somehow hide the blood loss from the autopsy. If this were the motive behind the murder, it would have been far more practical to make Connie Prince look like she had died from a wound that would have bled a lot, accounting for the blood loss. No, clearly Connie Prince had not been murdered through tetanus poisoning to hide murder by feeding, but the bite marks on her neck could not be unrelated either. They were fresh, even more so than the other, small spots over her face.

Sherlock grabbed his laptop and sat down at his desk. There were no obvious leads to follow for the bite marks, but there were leads to follow regarding the true cause of Connie's death and, therefore, the person behind it. Perhaps, once Sherlock had solved that aspect, the links to the bite marks would become more apparent.

He started up his laptop, immediately opening his browser, where Connie Prince's website was still open on the screen. When John had showed it to him earlier, he had noticed a link to a message board. God bless the internet; getting information nowadays was so much easier than it had been in the nineteenth century.

OoO

It took Sherlock well into the next morning to get the information that he needed from Connie Prince's message board. This was in part due to the inconvenience that was normal human sleeping habits, meaning that for the first several hours that Sherlock was online, very few others were. People started logging in early the next morning, but it took Sherlock several posts to get anyone's attention so that they could have a conversation. In his defence, he did try to be civil at first, requesting that someone send him a message. As it turned out, it was far more effective to just outright accuse Connie Prince of being a fake. No one answered his polite requests, but the moment he started insulting their idol, his inbox was filled with people determined to put him in his place.

It was only shortly after Sherlock had finished with the forum, and had made a couple of phone calls to follow up on his lead, when he got a call from John. He had sent the werewolf to the Prince household, to gather whatever information he could from Connie's brother while Sherlock did his work back at the flat. Judging by the fact that John was calling, it probably meant that he was still there; otherwise, he would have surely come back to Baker Street. He lifted the phone to his ear. "John."

"You were right," John said in way of greeting. His voice was hushed, confirming Sherlock's suspicions that he was still at the Prince residence.

"I generally am," Sherlock replied. "About what in particular, this time?"

"The bacteria got into her another way, and I think I know how. You're going to want to get over here."

Sherlock also believed he knew how the bacteria had gotten into her body, and he did not need to go to the Prince house to see it. However, he did not say this bit out loud. It would be interesting to see John draw his own conclusions. John had to learn Sherlock's methods in one way or another; Sherlock could see if he had gotten it right.

"There's one more thing," John said before Sherlock had the chance to hang up. His tone dropped a little bit more as he continued, but it was easy for Sherlock's superior hearing to pick up. "The place smells like vampire. It's not Kenny or the houseboy, and a lot of it's been masked by disinfectant, but I can still smell it."

"Interesting," Sherlock murmured. "Stay there, I'll be right over."

OoO

John was trying, really, to learn Sherlock's methods. Sherlock would have to commend him for that. All the same, he was still wrong. John thought that someone had coated the claws of Ms Prince's cat with the poison, so that when the cat jumped on her and scratched her (which it had done, of course – both of them had taken note of the scratches on the body in the morgue) it would unwittingly be poisoning her. It was a decent enough conclusion, really; John had taken into consideration the smell on the cat's claws, the marks on the woman's body, but it wasn't the right one. Sherlock made sure to correct him when they left the building.

It was the Botox that killed her. That had been the spots on her face – marks from the Botox injections, which were administered to her by Kenny Prince's houseboy, Raoul de Santos. A couple of phone calls made by Sherlock had shown him that de Santos had been bulk ordering Botox for months, biding his time until he could increase the dosage to something fatal.

The motive had been easy enough to gather from Prince's website. Connie and Kenny had some sort of falling out, and Connie threatened to disinherit him. He would lose the money, the lifestyle that he and his houseboy had grown so accustomed to, and so, of course, that gave de Santos the motive to get rid of Connie before it was too late.

John's next question, of course, was where the bite had come into it. Sherlock, unfortunately, had no way of being certain about this, but he had his suspicions. Connie's falling out with her brother had come of something of a surprise; no one on the website claimed they ever saw it coming. Sherlock's suspicion was that, around that time, Connie had met a vampire. Maybe they had been partners in some sense, maybe not. Either way, if Connie was being fed from regularly, she was receiving regular doses of venom. If the vampire had then tried to convince her to disinherit Kenny - perhaps in order to gain her fortune for them – then Connie might have been easy to persuade.

Sherlock explained the cause of death and the killer to Lestrade, and put the same information up on his website. He left the vampire out of it. There was no way he could prove that, nor could he explain it on a public website. The information he could put down, however, was enough.


	42. Chapter 42

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, a million thanks to my amazing beta/proofreading sidekick, Becca (LlamaWithaPen)!

A month.

Things continued in this way for a _month_.

There was no pattern to the arrival of the puzzles, but they turned up every few days, no longer than a week in between them. Sometimes the puzzles led them to older cases – some cold, which Sherlock had not been involved in at the time but was able to shed more light on now that his attention had been called to them, and some that had been solved by other detectives who had made a mistake or missed something. Other times, the puzzles led them to crimes that had only just been committed, often no more than several hours to a day earlier. One time, the puzzle even led them to a murder that had been committed half an hour _after_ the puzzle had arrived. This meant that Sherlock was at the Yard, being informed by an irritated Lestrade that no, to his knowledge, no one had drowned that morning, when Lestrade received the call that a body had been found by the Thames.

(This, of course, aroused a rather great deal of suspicion from Lestrade's team, who came to their own conclusions as to how Sherlock knew that a body was going to be found before the body was found. Lestrade trusted Sherlock, of course, but John heard a couple of them mutter something about Sherlock being a psychopath behind his back).

For John, it didn't matter so much that their investigation was going on for so long, because it was only a small portion of his life. He helped Sherlock with the puzzles whenever they came up, as long as there was something he could do, but he also continued to work at the clinic, and even went on dates. In between puzzles, he wrote up case notes on his blog, turning them into slightly more realistic stories (only slightly, though, because people were still stunned and sceptical when he told stories of chasing criminals through the back streets of London, or of Sherlock solving cases with nothing more than the wear on a person's clothing or the colour of their shoes to go off). With case work broken up by other people and other activities, it did not feel like the case was consuming him, or taking over his whole life.

But Sherlock – Sherlock was what John was worried about. Sherlock didn't have another job, or another hobby, and John wasn't even sure he had other friends outside of John. Sherlock's whole existence revolved around this investigation. He spent practically every waking minute working on it – and, as a vampire who did not require sleep, 'practically every waking minute' translated to 'practically every minute of the day and of the night'. If he was not working on a puzzle, then he was looking through old cases, looking for Moriarty's influence, even trying to track him back further than the Carl Powers case. On occasion, he was called in by Lestrade for a case that was apparently unrelated to the organisation, and this was the closest he got to any sort of external, non-organisation related hobby. Even then, however, with every case, he was always searching for signs of Moriarty, ways that it could be linked to the organisation. He was a man obsessed; the organisation was the centre of his universe and nothing else seemed to matter.

It worried John, because it was damaging Sherlock's heath. Mugs of blood went untouched when John sat them on his desk, and John noticed that the collection of blood bags in the bottom of the fridge was not depleting as rapidly as it should have been, had Sherlock been feeding enough.

OoO

"Should we really be doing this?" John had asked one morning following the solution of the Connie Prince case, while they were waiting on their fourth puzzle. At the time, Sherlock was bent over piles of old case files in search of Moriarty's involvement, a mug of tea by his side that had yet to be touched.

When Sherlock prompted for John to continue (prompted with a vague, questioning hum that did not involve him looking away from papers), John clarified, "Solving his puzzles. He's been several steps ahead of us this whole time, you know? We're playing _his_ game."

Sherlock looked up at him at this point, raising his eyebrows at John. "Do you have a better idea?" he had asked, and John faltered, dropping his gaze, because of course he could not come up with anything that Sherlock Holmes had not already.

When John failed to respond, Sherlock continued, "Every time he sends us a puzzle, he's unwittingly allowing us to get close to him. He cannot simply send us puzzles without giving us some sort of clue as to where he is or what sort of resources he has had access to or exactly what sort of cases he has been involved in. It's only a matter of time before he makes a mistake."

"Are you sure, though?" John asked. "I mean, he's been doing this for longer than you've been investigating it, apparently. If he hasn't made a mistake yet, what are the chances that he'll make one now?"

Sherlock frowned, looking down at the papers in front of him again. "Serial killers are always desperate to get caught, desperate to have their five seconds in the spotlight. I'm sure leaders of international organisations with the amount of power that Moriarty seems to have would feel the same."

"And for that matter," John continued, "how do we even know this is all coming from Moriarty? We're just assuming that it's all one person, but what if each puzzle is coming from a different part of the organisation? What if Moriarty wasn't even alive when Carl Powers was killed, but the shoes were passed down to him eventually through the organisation?" He paused for a moment, and then another thought hit him, and he added, "What if Moriarty isn't even a person? We don't know if Winthers was lying to us. What if Moriarty was the name of the organisation, or something?"

"Occam's Razor," Sherlock said with little hesitation, although John thought that, for a moment, he had seen something thoughtful flicker over Sherlock's expression. "The simplest explanation is generally the explanation you should choose; the explanation with the fewest assumptions. The moment you bring up the possibility that Moriarty is more than one person, or that there are more people than just Moriarty involved, it brings in more assumptions and complicates things."

"I don't know if an explanation involving an immortal vampire with an extensive list of contacts really counts as the simplest explanation."

A moment of silence passed before Sherlock spoke again. "At this point," he said, "there's no way for us to be sure of anything. However, if we start considering alternative explanations and complicating the issue, we will never manage to get anything done. Our only hope is to assume that Moriarty is a single person – most likely a vampire, but almost certainly an immortal creature – and work from there. If we're wrong, then we can only hope that that information comes to light as we continue our work."

OoO

When the next full moon came around, John spent it alone, once again. It wasn't his choice to, but when he asked Sherlock if he wanted to come, Sherlock insisted that it was necessary that he remained at the flat in case they received their next puzzle while John was away. John understood that, really. This case was important, incredibly so to Sherlock, and John understood that they couldn't both be out of action overnight, especially the night of the full moon. If anything was going to happen, it was going to be tonight, because a hunter might decide that a full moon was the optimal time to look for a werewolf, or a werewolf could hurt someone because it was the one night a month that they were completely out of control.

Of course, this was not at all a comforting thought for John, because he was one of the werewolves who could potentially be hunted or potentially cause harm, but Sherlock seemed to be of the belief that he had nothing to be concerned about. After all, the past several months had not resulted in John hurting any innocent humans, because humans seemed to be clever enough to know to keep out of the forest at night, and there was no evidence that any of the organisation of hunters was going after werewolves in London. Sherlock had been following the organisation closely enough to know that he would have seen something if there was anything to seen, and on the off chance that he had not, Mycroft would have known that non-human bodies had turned up and would have been dealing with it in one way or another.

Still, this was not very reassuring for John, because every hunter would have a first kill, and just because the previous full moons had been free of hunters did not in any way imply that this one would be.

But, Sherlock insisted that John had nothing to worry about, and, when John continued to voice his concern, Sherlock texted Mycroft and told him to keep an eye on security footage surrounding the forest, so that they would know if anyone had approached it after the visitor centres were closed. John made sure to leave for the forest earlier than necessary, as well, so that he had an opportunity to find a place as far away from any of the visitor centres as possible, as far away from any roads as possible, as well as giving him the chance to make sure that the forest really was empty before the full moon rose.

None of it was necessary, in the end. The night passed without incident; John woke up the next morning with no evidence that anyone had attempted to harm him in the night, and no signs of human blood or bodies that said that he had caused anyone harm himself. At least, there was no evidence that he had caused harm to anyone human. He woke up for a second month in a row with the taste of animal blood in his mouth.

And, for the second month in a row, he woke with absolutely no recollection of the night before.

OoO

When he wasn't with Sherlock, working on the case, John found himself spending most of his time with Mary. She was there more often than not on the days when he was given shifts at the clinic, and as the month progressed, they began to spend more time together outside of work as well, infrequent dates becoming gradually more frequent as time passed. Sherlock expressed his disapproval for John's dating at first, telling John that he was dividing his time up too much and not devoting enough of it to the case. However, Mary managed to win his respect one day when he rushed into the clinic, files and photographs in his hands.

On this particular occasion, Sherlock had received an anonymous comment on one of his older posts on his website, which, at a glance, seemed like nothing more than gibberish.

Ndj'gt tcydnxcv iwxh, pgtc'i ndj? Ydxcxcv iwt sdih?  
X'kt atui pcdiwtg egthtci udg ndj pi Apjgxhidc Vpgstch.

It had to be code for something – that was easy to work out. To determine exactly what code had been used would take a little bit longer, although Sherlock had no doubts that he was capable of doing so. He was almost certainly more capable than John on this matter. However, he wanted John to be with him when he cracked it. Judging by the time, John's shift was almost coming to an end, and it would be beneficial to be able to go straight to the crime scene – or to Scotland Yard, should the clue refer to a cold case – as soon as they worked out where the puzzle was leading them. So, he took a screenshot of the comment, printed it off, and took a cab to the clinic.

He told the cab driver to wait for him, and rushed through the sliding doors. John was standing by the receptionist desk, his bag open on the desk as he packed up his belongings. This time, the receptionist that John was with did not even seem shocked by his arrival. Sherlock initially paid little attention to her. He walked straight over to the desk, waving the piece of paper around in his hand. "We have another puzzle," he informed John.

John didn't bother taking Sherlock into his office this time, but he grabbed the piece of paper from Sherlock's hand to still it, so that his eyes could scan over the string of letters. "What is this?" he asked. "Some kind of code?"

"Obviously," Sherlock said. "It won't take me long to figure out how to decipher it, but –"

He did not get the chance to finish his sentence, because Mary – who, he realised belatedly, had been looking at the screenshot over John's shoulder – said, "It's a Caesar cipher, isn't it?"

Sherlock, of course, knew what a Caesar cipher was. He had spent less time studying codes and ciphers than he had studying things more directly related to crime scenes, such as blood splatter patterns and bruise formations after death, but he had more than a basic knowledge of ciphers and how to solve them, and a Caesar cipher was arguably the most basic cipher of them all. He had no doubts that, had he given himself the opportunity to sit down with the puzzle for a minute, he would have spotted the patterns that indicated that it was a Caesar cipher immediately. However, he was too startled by the fact that this ordinary woman had worked it out in a matter of seconds to say anything, and for a moment, he stared at her mutely. John, of course, was doing the same thing, albeit with a bit more confusion in his expression than just surprise.

"What?" John prompted, and Mary took the picture out of his hand, putting it flat on the reception desk.

"A Caesar cipher," she repeated. "It's where every letter in a message is substituted with another a certain number of places down the alphabet. Look, they all look like normal words, in terms of the number of letters and the punctuation; it's just the letters that don't make sense. It has to be that each letter is an equal number of letters away from the letter it's supposed to represent."

"Okay," John said slowly, "so how do we know how many letters away each real letter is?"

Sherlock opened his mouth to respond, but Mary got there first.

"The most common letter in the English language is 'E'," she said, shuffling through the papers on her desk until she found one that was blank on one side and did not contain anything important. She flipped it over so that the long edge was on the top, picking up a pen, and she quickly scribbled down the letters of the alphabet in one long line at the top. "So, the most common letter in this message is..."

Her eyes skimmed along the message, counting, but Sherlock was faster. "I."

"I," Mary repeated. "So, then if we..." She trailed off, writing the letter 'E' beneath the letter 'I' on her piece of paper, and then filling in the letters of the alphabet in order on the second line, making sure that each letter sat directly beneath one of the letters on the line above. When she was done, she looked over to John. "Show me the code again?"

John handed the picture over, and she set it up in front of her, beginning to write on the paper below her alphabets. She looked at the message in the picture, found the corresponding letter, and wrote it down, gradually beginning to decipher the text. Sherlock caught on straight away, and he stepped behind her so that he could look over her shoulder, finding each letter faster than she did and reading it out to her while she wrote it down.

"S," he finished, when they reached the end of the message, and when she wrote down the final latter, his eyes travelled over it, taking it in.

You're enjoying this, aren't you? Joining the dots?  
I've left another present for you at Lauriston Gardens.

"Lauriston Gardens," Sherlock breathed, and then he was pulling out his phone, dialling Lestrade's number. Lestrade had insisted on being contacted whenever a puzzle directed them towards anything that Sherlock suspected might be a crime scene, and in this case, Sherlock would admit to needing help. Lauriston Gardens was too vague an area to search by himself. When Lestrade picked up, he told him, quickly, that he had received another message and that there was something to be found at Lauriston Gardens – and no, he did not know exactly _where_ or exactly _what_ – and when he hung up, he took the photo of the screenshot and Mary's paper, and turned to head back out the door. "Come on, John!" he called over his shoulder, and he heard John murmur his goodbyes to Mary before following without argument.

"She's clever, isn't she?" John said, once they were sitting in the back of a cab.

Sherlock made a dismissive hand gesture. "It was a Caesar cipher; it's basic. I would have worked it out if she hadn't."

"'Course you would have," John replied. "But she helped. And come on, admit that you were a little bit impressed."

Sherlock gave him a look, and said nothing. In truth, however, he was a little bit impressed. Only a little, of course.

(And, of course, it wasn't like Mary was smarter than he was. When they found the 'present' – a body in number 3 Lauriston Gardens – Sherlock solved the case in record time. He doubted Mary could have done that.)


	43. Chapter 43

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for being a brilliant beta and for chatting to me whilst reading this chapter so that I could see her reactions in real-time. Side note, if you've not taken a look at her fic, you're missing out.
> 
> Another thanks to those of you who take the time to write comments. It means the absolute world.

This was taking too long.

Sherlock stood in front of the wall that he had turned into a map of Moriarty's work, hands pressed together as though he were praying, fingers pressed to his lips. It had been well over a month now since the puzzles had started, which meant it had been several months since Sherlock had first become aware of the organisation. That first hunter felt like an eternity ago, now.

And yet, it felt as though they were no closer to finding Moriarty than they had been when they had started. Sherlock had been solving the puzzles, marking down the locations of the crimes they referred to on his map in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, he would be able to spot some kind of pattern, to see where Moriarty or his organisation might strike next, or even some kind of central location that gave him some kind of idea as to where Moriarty might be. Looking back on it now, it seemed like a long shot, but Sherlock had been sure that solving the puzzles would lead them somewhere. Moriarty had to make a mistake eventually, didn't he?

John's words echoed in his head from several weeks ago, when the werewolf had asked if solving these puzzles was the right way to go about it. Was Moriarty gaining something from their work? What if they got it wrong and these cases weren't cases that Moriarty had been involved in originally? What if Moriarty was asking them to solve cases such as the location of Ian Monkford so that he, or his organisation of hunters, could go after him themselves? What if, by solving the murders of people like Connie Prince, Sherlock was giving Moriarty information that he could use for blackmail or bribery?

But that didn't seem likely, not to Sherlock. Moriarty was clearly powerful, clearly had resources. Surely he would not need Sherlock to locate anyone for him; surely he was capable of doing that on his own. More than likely, it seemed that Moriarty was toying with them, dangling murders and mysteries above their heads as if to say 'Look what I can do'. According to the map on Sherlock's wall, these cases were located all over London, all over England, even beyond it. Was Moriarty just making his way around the world to show off? Was he trying to demonstrate how much power he had, how many contacts?

"Where are you?" Sherlock murmured, stepping away from the wall so that he could refresh his laptop again, in case there were any new comments, any more puzzles. It had been a few days, now, since their last one, and Sherlock felt like another was due soon. That said, it was hard to predict when a puzzle would arrive, because there was no pattern to their arrival. For that matter, there was no pattern to the puzzles at all. Some days it would direct them to a more recent case, others to a case that would need them to dig through files at Scotland Yard, but there was no pattern.

Each case seemed to have more differences than similarities, too. Not all of them involved the supernatural, though it was something of a reoccurring theme. By Sherlock's calculations, about eighty percent of the cases showed evidence that a vampire (or, once or twice, even a werewolf) had been involved, but that still left twenty percent of the cases with nothing apparently unusual about them. Sherlock would have believed that Moriarty's involvement was indicated by the presence of a supernatural element, but that seemed to not be the case.

There were no new comments on Sherlock's website, or on John's most recent blog post. There had also been nothing in the mail that morning, and Sherlock had gotten into the habit of thoroughly checking his flat, 221C, and (when she allowed it, or when she wasn't around to complain) Mrs Hudson's flat whenever he came back, but there had been nothing out of place when he had checked it earlier today. They were at a standstill, yet again. Moriarty had the upper hand. He had had the upper hand since they had started, because their work depended almost entirely on him sending puzzles. They could not make their move until he had.

John was right (unfortunately): they were playing Moriarty's game.

Sherlock stared at his website, open on his laptop screen. He stared at the symbols that made up the most recent comment; their most recent puzzle had been a code, in which each letter was represented by an image of a dancing stick figure. It took Sherlock a full twenty-four hours to decode that one.

This was taking too long. Everything was taking too long.

He opened up a new post, tapping his fingers on the keyboard absently for a moment while he thought, before typing out one sentence.

Isn't it time we met?

It was a message that would confuse anyone else, but most people would disregard anything that didn't make sense to them. And if Moriarty was following Sherlock's website – which they knew he was – then he would get the message, and he would know exactly who it was directed to. He clicked 'Post', and the website made a sound as the post was sent onto his forum, there for the world to see.

It wasn't even two minutes later when his phone rang.

He picked it up, glancing at the caller ID and finding that it had been blocked. He knew immediately who would be on the other line. Quickly, he opened up a programme on his laptop to record the audio, put the phone on speaker so that his laptop would pick up the sound. There was no point trying to trace the number; Moriarty would be clever enough to use a burner. Recording the message was their best bet. Maybe, just maybe, he could gather something from that.

He pressed 'Accept' before the phone had time to ring for a fourth time. He lifted it to his mouth, leaning close to the laptop so that he was as audible as possible for the recording programme, and said, "Hello?"

The voice that came through the phone speaker was female, but there was something slightly expressionless about it, suggesting that it was coming from a computer or robot rather than a human being. If Sherlock listened closely enough, he could hear a clicking sound behind it that was most likely the sound of fingers on keys. "Hello, sexy. How are you enjoying my puzzles." There was no intonation at the end of the sentence that you would usually hear in a question, although Sherlock knew that there would have been a question mark at the end had the person been using their own voice, rather than the voice from a computer programme.

"Not as much as you're enjoying my attention, I'm certain."

"Cocky," said the voice. "And getting impatient, aren't you. You couldn't even wait for me to send you the next one."

"We've been playing this game for long enough, haven't we? It's about time we met. I'd love to put a face to a name."

"You would, wouldn't you. Patience, Sherlock, dear. All in good time."

Sherlock clenched his free hand into a fist, but he kept his voice calm. "Surely you have more important things to do than prolong this game. You're wasting your own time as well as mine."

There was a soft sound in the background while Sherlock waited for the next words. It sounded like a laugh. It was too quiet to gather anything about it; Sherlock could not tell if it was coming from a man or a woman.

"I'm flattered that you care so much about my work," the voice continued after a pause, "but don't you worry. I have plenty of time on my hands. You'd be surprised how much trouble I can get up to while I'm waiting for you to solve my puzzles. You're very slow, Sherlock. I had such high hopes."

"I'm sorry to disappoint. Come join me for tea, I'll make up for it."

"Cute," said the voice. "Don't worry, Sherlock, our game doesn't have long left. Let's not cut it off early, before the big finish. Ta ta, love."

Sherlock opened his mouth to say something, but the voice cut him off before he had a chance. "Oh, and keep an eye on your pet. He's not as smart as you or I. If he's not careful, he might get himself into trouble."

"John," Sherlock breathed, as the call ended. He slammed his laptop lid shut, knowing that would stop the recording at the same time, and he raced out the door, grabbing his coat on the way down and flying out onto the street.

He took a cab to the surgery, and he barely kept still in the backseat. His legs bounced and his fingers twitched, and he flew out of the door the moment he was able to. He raced through the sliding doors of the surgery, eyes scanning around the sick patients sitting in the waiting room, and the receptionist – not Mary, this time, but someone he didn't recognise. And no John.

"Can I help you?" asked the receptionist, but he was barging past her before she had the time to finish her sentence, ignoring her protests of "Hey, you can't go in there," as he rushed to the door of John's office and pushed it open and –

He found John standing in the centre of his office, in front of a woman who was undressed from the waist up. She screeched as the door flew open, folding her arms to cover herself, and at the same time, John yelled, "What the hell are you doing?"

Sherlock stilled for a moment, and then backed out of the room quickly, closing the door behind him.

The receptionist and the small gathering of people in the waiting room were all staring at him, startled by the commotion. Sherlock did not mind being the centre of attention when he was making clever deductions or proving a point, but this kind of attention was not the kind that he wanted, so he turned on his heels, flipping up his coat collar and walking back out the way he came.

It was less than ten minutes later when he heard the sound of John's voice, muffled through the glass doors. "Again, Ms Johnson, I am so sorry." He tuned it out for the most part, leaning back against the outside wall of the clinic. He found himself itching for a cigarette. It wouldn't do much for him – not needing to breathe meant that any sort of drug that was inhaled did not have the effects on him that it would have on a human – but it would give him something to do with his hands while he waited. That said, there was probably one of those law things that prohibited smoking outside a doctor's surgery.

The doors beside him slid open. The woman that John had been seeing several minutes ago emerged first, now fully dressed. She glanced in his direction enough to glare, and Sherlock heard her mutter something under her breath along the lines of "Freak", but she turned swiftly and stalked away with her head held high. Sherlock did not spare her enough of his attention to see where she went.

John came out a minute or so later, walking over to Sherlock and standing in front of him. He crossed his arms over his chest and fixed Sherlock with a serious expression, and Sherlock felt oddly like a child who was about to be scolded for misbehaving. Again, he wanted a cigarette.

"Explain," John said. "Now."

Sherlock pushed off the wall so that he was standing up straight. Really, there was no reason for someone as short as John was, especially in comparison to Sherlock, to look as intimidating as he did. "Moriarty called."

John's expression changed immediately. He didn't unfold his arms – clearly keeping up the pretence of being angry and serious – but his curiosity and interest quickly overrode the anger on his face. "What?" he prompted. "What happened?"

"Little that we can use, unfortunately. I recorded the conversation at the flat, so you're welcome to listen to it when you come back."

"Can we trace the call?" John asked, and Sherlock shook his head.

"He's too smart for that. He also used a computer programme to generate words rather than speaking to me directly, so I can't gather anything from the sound of his voice." Sherlock frowned, frustration visible in his features, and added, "He knows what he's doing. He knows how to keep us from getting any information that he isn't willing to share."

"Okay," John said slowly. "So if there was nothing important in the call, why did you barge into my office like the world was about to implode?"

Sherlock shifted and dropped his gaze to his feet, a strange feeling twisting in his stomach. It took him a moment to recognise it as embarrassment. He had jumped to conclusions, following Moriarty's call. He had focussed too much on emotions, and not enough on facts. That combination never leads to the optimal outcomes. Sherlock knew this and he should have thought it through first. Had he given himself a moment to think, he would have recognised that there was a very, very slim chance that Moriarty would have done anything to John before the call or immediately afterwards, because Sherlock had prompted the call with a forum post rather than letting Moriarty call when he wanted to.

"Well?" John prompted, and Sherlock realised that he was explaining himself in his head and not aloud. He took a moment before he responded.

"He alluded to the possibility that you are in danger."

John frowned. "I thought we were all in danger, seeing as we're kind of the people that hunters want to come after."

Sherlock shook his head. "No, he alluded to the idea that he – or someone within his organisation – might do something different to you, perhaps in an attempt to get to me, or to stop our investigation into the organisation."

The lines on John's forehead evened out as his expression softened. "I can look after myself, you know."

"We've seen what Moriarty is capable of. I'd rather not take any risks." He paused for a moment, and then added, "I think you should stay with me until this is over. Your bedsit isn't very secure and you'll be safer in the flat. I have a spare bedroom, and it's hardly as though I use mine anyway."

John blinked in surprise, raising his eyebrows. "Seriously?" When Sherlock nodded his head, John considered it for a moment, before shrugging. "If you and Mrs Hudson don't mind. I'll pick up some of my stuff after work today and bring it over."

Sherlock briefly considered informing John that he would come with him to his bedsit, to make sure he was not abducted on the way to gather his things, but then he forced himself to think rationally. The possibility of Moriarty making a move so soon, without taking his time to make them more fearful, was highly unlikely. So, he nodded again and said, "I'll have Mrs Hudson prepare the guest room for you."

"Sounds good," John said, and he glanced back at the surgery. "I have more patients to see, so I have to get back to work." He went to turn around, and then, right before returning through the doors, he looked back over his shoulder. "And next time you think I'm in mortal danger," he said, "try phoning me first."


	44. Chapter 44

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for editing this chapter, and to everyone who responded so brilliantly to the last.

It was about an hour after John's shift had ended when he found himself waiting at the door to 221B Baker Street, a small suitcase in his hands. He was not sure how long he would need to stay here for; Moriarty's threats could imply that they were reaching a point where this would all be over, but at the same time, this "game" had been going on for so long now that it was impossible to imagine an end being in sight. So, John had decided to take enough clothing to last a few days before he would have to do any washing, as well as everything that he would need to take to work. And, of course, he made sure to have his gun on him, as well, though he wasn't sure what good it would do without wooden bullets if Moriarty really was a vampire.

John did not have a huge number of possessions, so what he brought with him would easily be enough to last several weeks if it came to that. He could always go back to his bedsit if he needed anything more.

To his surprise, it was not Mrs Hudson who opened the door for him, but Sherlock himself. This was a first. Sherlock hardly glanced at him, instead leaning out the doorway to look over John's shoulder, eyes flickering up and down the street. "Were you followed?" he asked.

"I don't think so?"

Sherlock pursed his lips. "You should have been paying more attention. It would have been useful to know if any of the organisation's members knew you were staying here for the moment." He made a dismissive hand gesture, and continued, "No matter. There is just as much a chance that they could have wanted to break in here for me, regardless of whether you're staying here or not. We'll need to be on high alert at all times, of course. I've told Mrs Hudson to be cautious, as well."

"Is it safe for her to be here?" John asked, gaze flickering towards the door to Mrs Hudson's flat as he stepped past Sherlock and into the building. He dropped his voice to a hushed tone, continuing, "She's human, you know. She doesn't have to be a part of this and it's better she isn't at risk of being caught in the crossfire. Does she have, I don't know, family or friends she can stay with for a while?"

"She's not a fragile old woman, John, no matter how she might look," Sherlock said. "And she's got two supernatural bodyguards to keep her safe while she's here. I'm not planning on letting anything happen to her; are you?" He turned, gesturing to John to follow him up the stairs. John lingered for a moment by the door to Mrs Hudson's flat, and then made his way up after Sherlock.

The flat was a fair bit neater than the last time John had been here. The desk that contained all of their information on the organisation was still a mess, but the cushions had been set up neatly on each of the chairs and the sofa, and the table that usually contained enough scientific equipment to look like a miniature laboratory had been cleared off. John wondered briefly if Sherlock had been the one to clean up for his arrival, but then concluded very quickly that that was bound to have been Mrs Hudson's doing.

Sherlock glanced at the suitcase in his hands, and then gestured to the stairs leading to the next floor up. "There's a bedroom up there. You might as well leave your bag upstairs, so it doesn't clutter up the space down here."

John opened his mouth to point out that a single suitcase would hardly add anything to the several of Sherlock's belongings that were cluttering up the space as it was, but then decided against it. He turned around and made his way up the stairs to what would be his bedroom for the next several days, or weeks, or however long he was going to be staying here for.

The bedroom was not very large – undoubtedly smaller than the main bedroom downstairs – but it was still larger than John's room. Even if it hadn't been, he would not have complained, because it was kind enough that Sherlock was letting him stay here at all, so that he was a little bit safer than he would be back at home. Sherlock was under no obligation to do that, and it was probably quite strange for him to be letting a werewolf into his home at all, let alone giving one his own room.

John pushed his suitcase under the bed so it was out of the way, not seeing the point in unpacking right away. He might not need to unpack at all, depending on how long he stayed here. In truth, he wasn't sure he'd mind if he was here for a while. 221B was much nicer than his bedsit, and he had been sleeping with a gun under his pillow since they had found the camera in his room, just to be safe. Maybe that wouldn't be necessary, now.

Or maybe it would, seeing as Moriarty had made threats. Maybe he would keep his gun in reach, just in case.

He made his way back downstairs, going through the door into the kitchen so that he could put the kettle on. Sherlock had taken a seat at the desk in the sitting room again, laptop open in front of him. He did not say anything to John when he came down, but John did see Sherlock glance at him for a fraction of a second, which was more of an acknowledgement of John's presence than he usually got.

A moment of silence passed, broken by the sound of the kettle boiling, and then John asked, "Is this weird for you?"

Sherlock looked up at him, brow furrowing. "Is what weird for me?"

"Having me stay with you. I mean, we're not supposed to get along, aren't we? And I know you've said stuff about the way I smell. So is it weird for you to have me in your flat? In your territory, I suppose."

"Vampires aren't as territorial as werewolves are," Sherlock pointed out, and he shrugged his shoulders. "It might have been a problem when I first met you. You don't seem to smell as bad anymore. Perhaps I've just become used to you."

"Oh?" John said, sounding somewhat surprised, although, come to think of it, he had noticed the same thing. Sherlock had smelt like rotting flesh when they had first met, but he hardly noticed it now. He definitely noticed that Sherlock smelt like a vampire, that Sherlock had a different scent to the people they walked past, but it wasn't repulsive.

"Besides," Sherlock continued, "your scent tends to linger for at least a few hours, if not days, and you've spent plenty of time in my flat already. Your chair and the kettle both smell of you."

"My chair?"

Sherlock gestured over to the chair closest to the kitchen. "The one you usually sit in when you're here."

"I didn't realise that made it _my_ chair."

Sherlock raised his eyebrows at him. "Like I said, it smells of you."

John hummed, finishing making his tea and carrying it over to the chair that was apparently his, taking a seat. "Don't other people use it when I'm not here?"

"Hardly," Sherlock replied. "I don't often have guests. Clients sit on the sofa, and Mycroft insists on using my chair when he's here. He hasn't become used to your scent like I have."

"Huh," John said. "Fair enough."

Sherlock turned his attention back to his laptop. "So, to answer your question: no, it's not weird for me that you're staying here. However, I will have problems with you if you decide to start marking your territory by urinating anywhere but the toilet."

John threw the cushion at his head.

OoO

There were a number of benefits to living with Sherlock.

For one, it did make it easier for John to help with the case. This was undoubtedly the benefit that Sherlock was most happy about. John no longer lost time to travel in between his bedsit and the flat, and he was able to stay at the flat later, because he could simply go up to bed when he got tired rather than needing to leave earlier so he had enough time to get home and get ready for bed before he passed out. It also meant that, except for when John was either at work or having lunch with Mary, he was around more often for Sherlock to either tell him things about the case or occasionally ask questions (such as whenever they had a particular case that required any sort of medical expertise).

It did mean, unfortunately, that John now had no escape from Sherlock, and it meant that Sherlock had the ability to wake John up in the middle of the night because he had a breakthrough or had received a puzzle. He did not seem to understand that the fact that he did not need to sleep did not mean that John could go without it as well.

Another benefit to staying with Sherlock, however, was that, with the exception of the nights when Sherlock woke John up, John slept sounder. There was something reassuring about having someone else in the building who could keep an eye out for danger, someone who could keep watch while John was asleep. It was even more reassuring that this person was supernatural and therefore strong and capable of protecting both himself and John, and the fact that he did not need sleep meant that there was no risk of anything slipping in while they were both unconscious.

There was also the benefit of having Mrs Hudson around, who, despite her insistence that she was just their landlady, had a tendency to make far too much food and to give them the leftovers. There was also more food in the flat when Mrs Hudson did her grocery shopping, compared to the small amount of food that John had back at his bedsit (John had gotten into the habit of only buying necessities when he was still living off an army pension, and while he was capable of making basic dishes, he was never a remarkable cook. That, and he had rarely felt hungry when he had first gotten back to London. Seeing people you care about shot and killed in battle does take away one's appetite.) So, as long as Sherlock spared him time to eat, John never went hungry.

And, finally, living with Sherlock had the benefit of John actually being able to keep a closer eye on Sherlock.

"How often do you restock on blood?" John asked a few days after moving in, as he was going through the fridge in search of food. The fridge drawer was still stocked near to the top, which had scarcely seemed to change for weeks.

"When I need to," Sherlock replied absently from where he was sitting at his desk. He seemed to always be sitting at his desk nowadays, if they were in the flat. He was either at his desk, looking through files, or he was pacing in front of the wall that John had begun referring to as 'The Moriarty Mural' – the wall covered in maps and pins and photographs and whatever other visual pieces of information Sherlock had decided to move from the desk. John had found himself wishing, even while he was living in his own place, that he would come over and find Sherlock working on some other kind of experiment, or even watching crap telly, so that Sherlock was not devoting absolutely all his time and energy to a case that John was beginning to fear might never really be solved.

"When you need to," John repeated, glancing over his shoulder. The tone of voice, coupled with the fact that Sherlock was looking intently at the files and not looking at John, suggested that he was not paying that much attention to their conversation. That likely meant that he would be more honest, rather than consciously censoring himself. John continued, "So you haven't restocked in a while, then."

Sherlock hummed absently in agreement.

"So you haven't fed in a while, then," John continued.

Sherlock hummed again.

"Right," John said, and he pulled out a blood bag from the drawer, sticking a knife in the top to tear it open.

The smell of the blood pouring into the mug must have caught Sherlock's attention, because his head snapped up, and John could feel his gaze on his back. "I'm not hungry," Sherlock said shortly.

"No," John agreed. "You're starving. This case is not worth starving yourself to death over."

"For all intents and purposes, I'm already dead."

"You know what I mean." John put the mug in the microwave, turning it on and stirring his own tea while he waited.

"I'm feeding enough to keep up my strength; I don't need to feed any more than that."

"You're feeding at the bare minimum to keep you from turning into a corpse. It's not good for you."

"You're a human doctor; you don't know anything about what's good for me."

"I know you're supposed to feed every few days, and I know that at the moment you're not even feeding once a week. You need your strength for this case and you know it."

"I'm not hungry."

"Too bad." The microwave beeped, and John held his breath as he took out the mug, carrying it over to the desk where Sherlock sat. He saw Sherlock's gaze flicker over to it, but to his surprise, Sherlock did not look hungry. In fact, he almost looked... disgusted.

"Is this just about the case?" John asked quietly, sliding into the seat across from Sherlock. Sherlock resolutely avoided his gaze.

"You wouldn't understand," he muttered.

"Then explain it to me."

For a moment, there was silence. John watched Sherlock. Sherlock stared at his files. Then, Sherlock opened his mouth to speak –

– and his phone vibrated on the desk.

Sherlock snatched it up quickly, lifting it to his ear. "Sherlock Holmes," he said, followed a moment later by, "Of course." He put the phone down and got to his feet. "Lestrade," he informed John. "We've been summoned. Come on."

He turned and headed down the stairs, and John got to his feet and followed. The mug of blood stayed on the desk, untouched.


	45. Chapter 45

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to Becca (LlamaWithAPen) for being an absolutely phenomenal human being and for being my beta.

It wasn't as though Sherlock wasn't feeding whatsoever. John really was overreacting. If Sherlock were not feeding, he would have lost the ability to function as well as he was at present. He would not be out chasing criminals through London, or travelling from the flat to Bart's and back again, or even finding the energy to pace back and forth in front of the wall that Sherlock was using as a visual representation of his mind. Without even the slightest amount of blood in his system, he would be able to do nothing but lie there and stare at the ceiling (or perhaps at the wall, depending on how he fell, because he would not have the energy to roll himself over). Obviously, he was not at a point where he could do nothing, which meant he was feeding enough to keep himself functional, which meant he was fine. So, John had absolutely no reason to worry, or to get frustrated when Sherlock did not drink every time John left a mug by his side, like he had about an hour ago before he went up to bed.

The mug of blood that John had warmed up was still sitting there next to Sherlock's files, already cold, just as the last five mugs had over the past few days. It was still perfectly drinkable if he walked the few steps to the microwave and reheated it, but he had absolutely no desire to. Besides, he did not need to, not right now. In a few days' time, certainly, otherwise he would get to a point where he could not work well enough on the case. Sherlock was not going to compromise his ability to work just because he did not have an appetite for blood.

He stared at the mug beside him, looking as though it had somehow personally offended him, and then he reached for the handle, lifting it with two fingers and inhaling. It wasn't as though there was anything wrong with the blood itself. It wasn't as though Sherlock could identify any way that the smell differed from any of the previous bags of A Positive blood that he had had in the past. And yet, the smell made him grimace. Nothing had changed about the blood itself, but something had changed about Sherlock. At some point, feeding had become an undesirable pastime.

Well, no, it was not 'at some point'. Sherlock could identify exactly when he had stopped wanting to feed from the bags he had in his fridge. There was a reason why, once Mycroft had successfully weaned him off fresh blood and he had stopped feeling that same, insatiable bloodlust, he had taken to feeding from bags and never from a living being. This was why he had not taken interest in having a feeder. Blood was not the same when it has been sitting in bags in the fridge, outside of anyone's body for who-knows-how-long. It satisfied the hunger, of course, because in the end, it was all blood that wound up circulating through your veins, giving you the ability to function, to be as close to alive as possible. However, it did not satisfy the cravings, the innate desire to feed from a living being. Feeding was not necessarily associated with a desire to kill, not always, but there was a desire there to feel one's fangs puncture skin, to taste warm, fresh blood and not blood that had been warmed in a microwave.

Sherlock had suppressed these cravings many years ago. Mycroft had kept him locked away for months to drain him of any blood that had been taken from an addict, feeding him from bags only when he was almost empty so that the drugs were completely out of his system. When he had been left out, he had spent years learning to handle the scent of fresh blood without wanting to feed, learning to drink from blood bags and only blood bags until the taste of fresh blood was no more than a distant memory.

And then John had gone and lifted a bleeding cut to his lips.

He did not blame John for this, of course. John had not known at the time what he was doing, and Sherlock was aware that he had given him little choice, because he had been at death's door once again and had refused the bagged blood he was offered at first. Yet the taste of fresh blood had stirred something inside Sherlock, a desire that had been dormant until now, and though it was not nearly as intense as it had been when he had been a newborn, it was there, simmering beneath the surface. Bagged blood wasn't satisfactory any more.

It wasn't that he wanted to go out and feed from a living human, either. It wasn't that it had stirred within him the primal desire simply to hunt. But it had changed something, and now the smell of blood in a mug was wrong, undesirable.

And the smell of John's blood... wasn't.

Sherlock squeezed his eyes shut tight, pushing the thought out of his mind. He did not need a feeder, and he most definitely did not need to feed from John. It was a temporary problem, while his body became accustomed to bagged blood again, that was all. There was nothing more to it than that.

OoO

Late one night, a few days later, John came downstairs fully dressed and wearing shoes. Usually, if John was not going out, he was happier to walk around barefoot. Sherlock glanced at the time on his phone, but it was too late for John to have a shift at work. "Going somewhere?" he asked.

John frowned at him, making Sherlock think that the answer should be obvious – or, at least, that John expected the answer to be obvious. Had they already had a conversation about this? Maybe John had told him that he was going out while Sherlock had him on mute. He started to rewind through the conversations of the day in search for the answer, but, fortunately, John filled in the blanks.

"It's the full moon."

Sherlock almost hit himself for being so stupid. It was such a careless mistake. He should have been keeping track of the days, and he should have known that it was the full moon tonight. In fact, he should have been more aware of tonight than any of the previous full moons, because tonight was the first full moon following the phone call from Moriarty and the threats that he had made.

"I'm coming with you," Sherlock said, standing quickly. John raised his eyebrows, looking surprised.

"Are you sure?" he asked. "Don't you have the case to worry about? You said last time that you thought I'd be fine, because you've been tracking hunters and making sure they're not in London and everything."

"The case can wait one night," Sherlock replied, looking around for his shoes and his coat. "You're spending it in the forest again, I presume?"

John nodded. "It's worked for me so far. Might be good, having you there, anyway. You seemed to help the other time." He paused, and then added, "That said, maybe that was because that time wasn't a full moon."

"We'll soon find out," Sherlock said, throwing his coat over his shoulders. "Ready?"

OoO

The drive to the forest was spent in silence, as was the walk once they got there. Sherlock watched John out of the corner of his eye, noting the way he clenched and unclenched his left hand, and taking note of the tension in his shoulders and his back. "You're nervous," he commented as they moved further into the forest, searching for the safest place for John to shift.

"I always am," John said.

"So it's not because I'm here?"

"Arrogant git." John glanced over at him, a flicker of a smile pulling over his lips, though it faded quickly. "I don't know if I'll ever get used to shifting like this."

"From my experience, other werewolves seem to," Sherlock said. "I doubt you'd be an exception to that."

"Well, let's hope you're right." John came to a stop in the middle of a clearing, eyes scanning the area. "This is as good a place as any," he said, glancing up at the moon. "We've got a bit before the moon reaches its peak. We might as well sit down."

OoO

They made small talk, because John made it quite clear that full moon nights were not good nights to talk about anything more serious. Even then, the conversation came more stilted as time went on, until it reached a point where they just sat in silence. Sherlock checked the time on his phone a couple of times, but John did not ask what the time was at any point. Apparently, he did not need to. About five minutes before midnight, according to Sherlock's phone, John stood and started undressing.

Sherlock tilted his head to the side, looking somewhere off into the darkness rather than directly at John. "You know it's about to start," he said. He didn't phrase it like a question, but John nodded his head.

"I can feel it," he said tightly, moving his clothes beneath one of the nearby trees and then returning to the clearing. "Do me a favour and just... make sure you're not in my way."

Sherlock scrambled to his feet immediately, taking a few steps back to give John space. John, it seemed, had timed it perfectly, because it was no more than a few seconds later when the shift began.

It had been a long time now, since Sherlock had seen John shift, but he could still remember the event clearly, and compare it to tonight. The process did not seem to take as long as it had the last time Sherlock saw him, but it didn't seem any less painful. It would be getting faster and faster each time, of course, but on top of that, unlike last time, there were no pauses in the process for John to catch his breath. Last time, it had seemed like John was in control, at least a little. This time, all that control seemed to be taken by the moon.

When it was done, John collapsed on the ground, four furry legs buckling beneath him, but it was only a second later that he was scrambling to his feet. Sherlock saw him sniff the air, and then, apparently catching onto Sherlock's scent, he turned to face the vampire and let out a low, warning growl.

Just like he had last time, Sherlock lowered himself to the ground, to put himself in a submissive position and make him seem like less of a threat. He kept his eyes downcast rather than looking directly into John's, knowing that for dogs, and likely for wolves, eye contact was a sign of aggression. However, he could not resist letting his gaze flicker over John's body a little, taking in the way his hackles were raised and his lips were pulled back in a snarl to show his sharp teeth.

"Come on, John," he said slowly, softly. "Just like last time. Focus for me."

Come to think of it, John looked a bit more aggressive than last time. A bit more savage.

"Focus," he repeated. "You know who I am. You know who you are."

John growled. His paws shifted on the ground, moving the dirt and leaves around beneath him.

One more time, Sherlock said, "Focus, John", in the hope that it would help get through to the werewolf just a little bit more. Then, slowly, he raised his gaze, hoping to see something different in John's eyes, something that said he was seeing _Sherlock_ and not _vampire_ , seeing _friend_ and not _threat_.

John snarled, and lunged.

Sherlock exploded into movement, dropping from his crouch to the ground so that he could roll out of the way of John's snapping jaws, and he rushed to his feet before John had the chance to notice that the vampire was not underneath him. It only gave him a second or two, because John was immediately on his feet again as well, whirling around to find where the vampire had ended up.

Sherlock would continue to insist that he could win against John in a fight, if it came to it. Sherlock would continue to insist that, if he needed to, he could get his fangs into the werewolf's throat, even though layers of thick fur, and inject him with enough venom to make sure he did not pose a threat. However, Sherlock had a very clear memory of being pinned beneath large paws, of large jaws snapping in front of his face, and of a security guard with a Taser being the only reason that he managed to make it out alive.

In situations like these, he decided, there were better options than staying back and trying to fight.

Sherlock turned on his heels and ran.


	46. Chapter 46

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A thousand thanks to the best beta in the world (Becca/LlamaWithAPen) and the best readers in the world (you guys).

Sherlock could hear John following him, paws slamming against the dirt, sending rocks flying behind him. He could remember from the last time they had run through this forest – under vastly different circumstances – how fast John was. If anything, John seemed even faster now, now that he was running not to chase and play and win a silly game, but to kill.

The only reason Sherlock had managed to stay ahead of John last time was because he was clever, and agile, and he had known to choose narrower, twisted paths that would force John to slow down. He did the same thing this time, sliding through narrow gaps between trees and making sharp turns whenever he had the opportunity, to try to stay ahead.

However, Sherlock was weaker this time, too. He should have fed before coming. He was realising that now, with the way his legs burned with every step. He should have fed, but he hadn't thought that he would need to. He'd foolishly presumed that John's clarity of mind last time meant that he would be fine in Sherlock's presence this time. He had completely forgotten to factor in the moon.

He grabbed onto a branch and propelled himself around the tree, changing directions suddenly. It gave him an advantage for only a matter of seconds, but then John was gaining on him again. He could not outrun John forever, and John was showing no signs of giving up, no signs of recognising Sherlock.

There had to be a better way. He could not outrun John, and he could not spend the next several hours running, scarcely a metre ahead of John the whole time. Maybe, however, he could get away from him another way. Maybe he could get to somewhere where John could not reach him.

John was fast, but John could not climb trees.

He grabbed onto a branch and swung himself up off the ground, reaching for a second branch with his other hand. He could hear John getting closer and closer, and he knew he was still too low. He dragged his leg up onto another branch, and then threw his hand up to another, hoisting himself higher.

And then he hesitated, for half a second, because there was a smell in the air that was slightly too artificial to belong to the forest. For half a second, he feared that there was someone else here.

He did not get more than half a second to even consider this, because John leapt off the ground beneath the tree, and Sherlock had not managed to get high enough to get out of reach. John's jaws closed around the bottom of Sherlock's coat, and the weight of the wolf was too much for Sherlock to hold. John fell, and he pulled Sherlock with him.

Sherlock tried to grasp for a branch, but it slipped between his fingers, and then he his back hit the ground. It would have knocked the air out of him had he needed to breathe. He tried to move, to get out of the way, but he wasn't too fast enough, and then John was pinning him, paws on his chest, mouth too close to Sherlock's face for comfort. Sherlock's own hands pressed at John's torso, trying to push him away, but he could barely keep John's face far enough from him, and his arms shook with the effort.

There would be no security guard with a Taser to save him this time. He could feel John's hot breath on his face, feel every snarl as it vibrated John's chest against his hands.

"John," he gasped, ducking his head to protect his throat even though a bite anywhere else on his skin was just as deadly. "John, _please_."

John growled, and then froze.

Sherlock kept his hands against John's chest, but he could not hold him away any longer, could not stop his elbows from bending as John leaned forward. He felt John's wet nose against his jaw, nudging against it, forcing him to tilt his head back. It went against every instinct to expose his throat to the werewolf, but John was not trying to bite him, and Sherlock feared that if he made any sudden movements, or any movements against John's desires, the werewolf might try to attack him again. So, very slightly, he forced his body to relax, forced his head to tilt back a little. He felt John's nose at his jaw, then at his throat, felt him inhale near Sherlock's neck.

Then John stepped back, stepped off Sherlock's chest, and lowered himself to a non-threatening position on the ground.

Sherlock let out a breath he didn't realise he had been holding, and fell back against the dirt.

If he had a heartbeat, he knew that it would be racing, and even though he did not need to breathe to survive, he took a couple of gasps of air, willing away the aching sensation in his arms and his legs. It had been too long since he had fed. He would have been fine had John recognised him immediately and not thought he was a threat, but Sherlock still should have prepared for the worst. Mycroft would tell him that he was an idiot, if Mycroft found out what had happened. If John had not regained his sanity, then Sherlock might have died, because of his own carelessness.

He let out a huff of breath and closed his eyes. He could have died, but he hadn't. There had been plenty of situations in the past like that, and there would undoubtedly be plenty in the future. He could have died, but here he was. There was no point dwelling on what could have been. He was still here, scratches on his body from the branches already healing, and no sign of wolf bites on his skin or poison in his veins. John had managed to recognise him. That was the most important part.

He turned his head to the side, looking over at John. The werewolf had lowered himself to the ground, lying flat on his stomach, with his chin resting on his front paws. His expression and his body language no longer indicated that he believed Sherlock to be a threat. He was gazing at Sherlock in a way that almost looked sad, apologetic.

"You scared me," Sherlock said quietly. It was a hard thing to confess, made easier to say only by the fact that he was talking to what appeared to be an animal rather than a human, and therefore someone who could not respond. Granted, he remembered John saying last time that he had been able to understand what Sherlock had been saying to him, but it was still easier to dismiss that thought when John was looking like this.

John let out a soft whine, and Sherlock took that as an apology.

He sat up slowly, not wanting to make any sudden movements just in case it snapped John back into the mindset that he had been in a few moments ago. Sherlock was not sure he would survive a second time. He sat up straight, brushed some of the dirt off the back of his coat, and then looked over at John. Just like he had the last time he had seen John in this form, he extended a hand slowly, holding it a little way in front of John's nose. He watched John's gaze follow the movement, and after a moment, John raised his head from his paws just enough to nudge Sherlock's hand, and Sherlock reached for his head, running his fingers through the thick fur and scratching the place behind John's ears.

John's tail thumped against the dirt once, and he closed his eyes.

OoO

Of course, John was not content to sit by Sherlock's side the entire time, even with Sherlock's hand running through his fur. There was something about the full moon that seemed to fill him with a sort of restless energy, and after a few minutes of sitting still, he was on his feet again. He sniffed around at the dirt, paced around the small distance between the trees, and at one point in the night something in one of the trees caught his attention and he placed his front paws on the trunk, scratching and barking as he attempted (to no avail) to either climb up or bring the creature down.

It would be a good idea, perhaps, to go for a run, to help John use up some of his energy. However, Sherlock did not want him to get confused halfway through a game of chase and lose his sanity again, and Sherlock feared making any sudden or unexpected movements. For the most part, he sat there in the clearing and just watched John move around. He was prepared to follow every time that John left his line of sight, but to his surprise, John never went too far from him. He paced, and even ran a bit when he heard something further off, but by the time Sherlock got to his feet to follow, John had already returned, every time. He wondered if John usually stayed in a particular spot which he had marked as his territory, or if he was staying with Sherlock intentionally.

It was only about half an hour before the sun rose when John seemed to settle. His pacing had gradually become slower, and he seemed less on-edge, less jumpy at the sounds of anything scurrying through the trees or through the forest, out of sight. He sniffed around at one of the tree trunks, and then turned around, and walked towards Sherlock. The vampire stiffened instinctively, but John walked slowly, not in a way that suggested he was stalking or about to lunge and attack. It seemed he was still holding onto his sanity, still aware of who Sherlock was.

He walked over, pressing his nose to Sherlock's knee for a moment, before lying down on the ground beside him. Then, slowly, John rolled onto his side, just a little, and rested his chin on Sherlock's knee.

Sherlock hesitated, and then reached out and ran his fingertips gently through the fur atop John's head, watching as John blinked slowly, and then closed his eyes.

OoO

Just before the first signs of sunlight began to glow through the forest, John moved once again. He did not seem to have fallen asleep in the time that he lay with Sherlock, because he did not seem groggy in any way when he woke up, but Sherlock did notice that the sound of his heartbeat had slowed while he was there. Now, however, as he got to his feet, Sherlock heard it start to pick up again, and he knew that it was almost time for John to change back. Sherlock climbed to his feet to give John some space, and it was less than a minute later that light broke over the horizon, sending a warm glow filtered through the trees, and John let out a howl.

Watching John shift back was much like the reverse of watching him shift earlier; once again, it was faster than the first time he saw John shift, and not broken up with moments for John to catch his breath. Sherlock watched his body contort, watched his arms and legs lengthen, watched paws stretch into hands and fingers and feet and toes. He watched as the fur seemed to almost sink back into John's flesh, watched his skin ripple as it stretched and shortened over the new shape of John's body, and then, finally, watched John collapse onto the ground with a gasp.

Just like last time, Sherlock stripped off his coat and handed it to John, who sat up and wrapped it around himself, rubbing his arms as though he were trying to warm himself up. The forest was not that cold, not to Sherlock, but he noticed that John was shivering.

"I'm sorry," John murmured quietly after a moment.

"What for?"

"I tried to kill you."

Sherlock scoffed – a reaction that made John frown in confusion, but also prompted John to actually meet his eyes rather than avoiding his gaze. "Please," Sherlock said. "That was several hours ago."

The comment did not seem to cheer John up as much as Sherlock thought it would, so his expression softened a little. "You tried," he said. "And then something brought you back to earth, and you didn't. You managed to gain enough self-control to stop yourself from hurting me, which is the more important part. And you managed to gain self-control despite it being the night of the full moon, which means you're getting stronger."

John looked unconvinced, but Sherlock continued before he had a chance to argue. "I'm fine," he said. "And you're fine. If you dwell on what could have happened, you'll never focus on anything else." Sherlock looked around, and then looked back to John. "Come on. We'll find wherever you left your clothes and then we'll go home."

John got to his feet slowly, wrapping his arms around himself and wincing in pain. "Why can I only remember things when I'm with you, Sherlock?" he asked quietly.

"I don't think it's me, specifically. I think it's just the result of having something to appeal to the more human part of you, something to help you focus."

"Then we need to find something that will help me focus without you being here so I don't almost kill you again."

"I don't think you'll kill me. You'd have done so tonight if that were the case. Every moon is bound to get easier."

John frowned. "Hopefully."

"Come on," Sherlock said after a pause. "Can you walk?"

"Yes, of course," John replied.

"Good," Sherlock said, turning to head back through the forest in the direction they had run from. "Then let's get you out of here before you fall asleep standing up."


	47. Chapter 47

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to Becca/LlamaWithAPen for both beta-ing this chapter and live-messaging me while she did it so I could read her reactions in real time.

John fell asleep in the cab on their way back to Baker Street. It didn't even take him five minutes. He had changed into his own clothes, but Sherlock had noticed that he was still shivering even once he was dressed, so he was still wearing Sherlock's coat on top. It was far too big for him; he was almost swimming in it, sleeves hanging down beneath his arms, but it was warm, which was the important part. He had slumped against the car door as soon as the vehicle started moving, and it was only moments after that when Sherlock heard his heart rate slow down to a speed that suggested he was unconscious.

Glancing at him out of the corner of his eye, Sherlock saw that the short rest did not seem to smooth out the lines in Johns' face, and his body did not seem to relax. Even through the coat, Sherlock could see the tension in John's back and shoulders and in the way his arms were wrapped around himself. However, his sleep was dreamless enough for John not to stir for the entire trip.

Of course, the cab driver had many questions about why the two of them had needed to be picked up from the outside of a forest first thing in the morning, before any of the visitor's centres were open. He asked whether or not they had spent the night there, and why they had spent the night there, and why John was so exhausted. Sherlock merely stared out the window and refused to answer any of the questions. Eventually, the driver took the hint.

When the cab pulled up in front of Baker Street, Sherlock pulled his wallet from his pocket and paid the driver before turning his attention to John. He had not been woken by the sound of the engine changing as the cab went from moving to still, so Sherlock prodded him repeatedly with one finger until he finally stirred, grumbling and trying to jerk his arm away from Sherlock's hand.

"Oh, quit your complaining," Sherlock said, prodding John one more time to make sure John actually opened his eyes and blinked himself awake. "There are far more comfortable places to sleep than the back of a cab. Come on."

Sherlock climbed out of one door, and it took John a moment to follow, yawning. He followed Sherlock up to the door, but his footsteps and his movements were a lot slower, a lot stiffer. He wasn't limping, but it would be apparent to anyone who saw him that he was sore, like he had done some sort of intense work out the day before and had woken up this morning aching all over. They both stepped through the door, and John shrugged off Sherlock's coat, wincing as he rolled his shoulders, and then he hung the coat on the hook on the back of the door.

Sherlock closed his eyes and listened, focussing his attention on the inside of Mrs Hudson's flat. He could hear her heartbeat, slow and steady – she had not woken up yet. He was glad to check that she was still all right. It was unlikely that Moriarty would do anything to harm her, but he would rather be certain and make sure that she was still around every time he returned to the flat. It was also good to know that she was still asleep, because it meant that they both avoided being asked questions about where they had been all night. Granted, Mrs Hudson would assume they were working on a case, so she would not really be that concerned.

"All right?" Sherlock asked, glancing over his shoulder, and John nodded his head.

"Yeah," he said. "Just really tired."

Sherlock led the way upstairs, and once they were up, John went straight into the kitchen and put the kettle on. He rubbed his eyes as he waited for it to boil, and then moved to the cupboard to find the teabags. Sherlock opened his mouth to suggest that coffee might be more suitable to wake John up, and then noticed that the bag that John chose was chamomile. John clearly was not planning on waking up properly just yet.

"I'm going to go up to bed," John said, as he waited for the kettle to finish, and then he poured the boiling water into his mug – one that he had brought from home – and jiggled the bag around inside of it. "You can wake me if anything important happens, but if you don't need me, I'd really rather just sleep."

He opened up the bin and threw away the teabag, and then turned back to Sherlock, adding, "And when I say wake me if something important happens, I mean really important. Something you _really_ need me for, not something you can handle on your own. Okay?"

Sherlock pursed his lips, but he nodded his head. It seemed like a waste of time, for John to be out of action for an entire day when they had something as important as this case going on, but he knew that John usually spent the day immediately following the full moon recovering. He could work if he needed to – it was the day after the full moon when Sherlock had set up the meeting between John and the gun manufacturer, after all – but John was clearly not at the top of his game today. It might be best that he was given the opportunity to rest and recover so that he was ready to act when need be.

Plus, Sherlock knew for a fact that John had gotten absolutely no sleep last night, and had been on his feet for most of it, excluding the last half hour or so before the full moon. It was not surprising that John was so exhausted this morning.

"All right," Sherlock said, albeit with somewhat reluctance. "I'll wake you only if it's absolutely necessary."

"Ta," John said, and he turned, taking his cup of tea upstairs.

OoO

John really did sleep through most of the day, which Sherlock found surprising. He knew John was tired, but he could not understand how John could be so exhausted that a few hours of sleep that morning did not refresh him enough. How could John be willing to sacrifice an entire day to sleep, to waste time being unconscious when there were far more important things to be doing?

But, people had always been different to Sherlock, even before he had been turned. Really, it was almost convenient that he had been turned into a vampire, because it meant that he could give up on sleep entirely, rather than surviving on the small number of hours he allowed himself every few nights to make sure his brain remained functional. It was far more convenient to not need to sleep at all.

John did wake once, early in the afternoon. Sherlock heard him use the bathroom upstairs, and then he came down and put the kettle on again. Sherlock had hoped that this meant that John was waking up properly now, but when he asked if John was staying up this time, the response he received was a shake of the head and a muttered, "Not here. Not awake. Talk later."

John took his cup of tea back upstairs, and when Sherlock tuned into any sounds upstairs several minutes later, he heard that John's heart rate had slowed down once again.

How the man could spend this much time unconscious was beyond Sherlock, though he resisted the temptation to go up there and wake John up himself.

There was little that John could help with at this point, anyway. No new puzzles had turned up – not for several days now, which was rapidly decreasing Sherlock's patience and also making him believe that something big was coming, perhaps even the big finish that Moriarty had spoken about. Sherlock had gone through his notes over and over again, but nothing new was jumping out at him.

He had gone through the security footage that Mycroft had sent him from outside the library, the day that the puzzle had been posted on his forum from one of the public computers. He watched as people came and left – women, men, and children, some angling their faces away from the camera either intentionally or thoughtlessly, others looking straight at it for a split second as their eyes wandered the street. No one jumped out at him as suspicious, and at the same time, all of them did. Any one of those people could have made the post, and therefore any one of those people – or more of them – could be a member of Moriarty's organisation. One of them could even be Moriarty himself. But they had nothing to go off, nothing to look for as they tried to get closer to finding Moriarty and breaking down the organisation for good. There was nothing that they could do to make sure that Sherlock, John, Mycroft, and any of the other supernatural creatures in London were not targets of a mass organisation of hunters.

At least, that was until after the sun set.

Sherlock had taken his usual seat at the desk, going over some of the files yet again. At this point, he was reasonably certain that he could quote a fair portion of them exactly, because of how many times he had sat here and stared until the text had gone fuzzy in his eyes. Moriarty had kept himself hidden, but surely somewhere he had to have slipped up, at least once. Serial killers slipped up eventually, even if they managed to get away with several murders over several months, or several years. It had been far more than several years. Could Moriarty really have managed to evade not only capture but also the attention of _anyone_ for that long?

Sherlock's laptop was open in front of him, the security footage that Mycroft had sent from outside the library still open from when he had last watched it, but paused. Perhaps he could rewatch the second half, from after the message had been sent. Whoever sent it had to have left the library eventually; one of the faces leaving the building had to be them. It was just a case of working out how to rule out the other hundred or so people.

The screen went dark, which Sherlock assumed was because he had not used the laptop in several minutes now. That, or his battery was flat. He reached for the touch pad, so that he could move the cursor and either wake the laptop back up again or work out if he needed to go and find his charger, but then something on screen caught his attention, making him freeze.

The screen wasn't completely dark. Near the top, there was a small, white symbol.

No, not a symbol, he realised when he shifted his gaze to it properly.

The letter "M".

This was followed by an underscore, and a blinking cursor, which Sherlock watched, as it moved across the screen and revealed the words:

          I THINK IT'S TIME WE MET.

Sherlock's gaze flickered towards the staircase leading up to the spare bedroom, and he listened. John's heart rate had not changed; he was still fast asleep. Sherlock turned back to the screen and reached for the keyboard, typing out a response.

                    I'm finding I agree.

The response came up on the screen, letter by letter, only a matter of seconds later.

          M_ THE FOREST. BY THE RIVER WHERE THEY FOUND LITTLE CARL.

                    Fitting, but do you really believe I'm stupid enough to go to a location of your choice?

The response came instantly.

          M_ YES.

          M_ YOU KNOW THAT THIS IS YOUR ONLY OPTION. YOUR FEAR OF WALKING INTO A TRAP IS NOT GREATER   
          THAN YOUR FEAR OF NEVER FINDING OUT THE TRUTH.

          M_ I AM NOT PATIENT, SHERLOCK. I WILL NOT WAIT FOR LONG. IF YOU WISH TO SEE ME BEFORE I LEAVE   
          LONDON, I SUGGEST YOU COME QUICKLY.

          M_ DO NOT KEEP ME WAITING.

The cursor blinked at him a few more times, and then vanished, leaving the text on the screen but making it clear that no one was there to read and reply any longer.

Sherlock hesitated. He shouldn't go. He knew that. If Moriarty had chosen the location for their meeting, he could have so easily set a trap. He could have people waiting in the shadows, snipers with wooden bullets and perfect aim. Perhaps he could even have werewolves, less friendly than John, prowling through the forest and waiting for something to kill.

But Moriarty was right. Sherlock's fear of getting caught was minimal, compared to his fear of never meeting Moriarty.

He got to his feet, grabbing his coat, but he hesitated before he went downstairs.

After the events of last night, John would be too weak. Bringing him would only put him at risk. He did not have to be in the middle of this. Moriarty was not after him.

Sherlock crept upstairs, footsteps as silent as he could manage, and he pushed the door to John's room ajar. John was still fast asleep, heartbeat slow, breathing even. His gun was sitting on the bedside table beside him, easily in reach should something happen in the night.

John would not have wooden bullets, and normal bullets would not kill a vampire. However, they would still hurt, potentially slowing him down if need be, and it gave Sherlock the opportunity to bluff.

He sneaked in silently, took the gun from the bedside table, and hesitated for two seconds to make sure that the sound had not woken John. It did not; his heart was still beating slowly, evenly.

Sherlock turned, and headed downstairs, out the door, and into the night.

OoO

It was dark outside, but clearly it was not too late for Sherlock to get a cab. It took him less than a minute before one drove down Baker Street and stopped when he signalled for it. The driver, thankfully, did not bother with small talk, nor did he ask why Sherlock was heading to a forest at this time of night. Sherlock's gaze flickered over him briefly, taking in the shaving foam behind his ear and the torn picture of children at the front, but otherwise, paid no attention to him.

When they reached the outskirts of the forest, Sherlock paid the driver and climbed out, careful not to dislodge John's gun from the waistband of his trousers. The feel of it against the small of his back was only somewhat reassuring, though it was certainly better than being out here completely unarmed. Sherlock resisted the urge to reach for it, in case he needed the fact that he had a weapon on him to be a surprise.

He moved through the forest as quietly as he could manage. Moriarty's hearing would be better than a human's, so Sherlock could not take any chances. At the same time, his own senses were on high alert; he heard every rustle of wind through the leaves, every scrape against bark that told him that there was a bird or another such creature in one of the trees.

He could smell the river as he got closer to it, as well as hear the gentle rushing of water downstream. The sound had some benefits, in that it would mask the quiet sounds of his footsteps, but it would do the same for Moriarty. Sherlock strained his ears to hear past it, but there was nothing that caught his attention, not yet.

It was unlikely that he would have arrived before Moriarty. The closer that Sherlock got to the river, the closer he got to Moriarty himself. Months of work, tracking and tracing and watching and waiting, and it was all about to come to a head.

He reached the edge of the river, and stopped, listening. The sound of the water seemed almost deafening in the silence. Sherlock strained to hear beyond it.

There was a smell in the air, and he inhaled through his nose, taking it in. He recognised it immediately as the same scent he'd caught onto last night, that had made him fear there might be someone else in the forest. Now that he wasn't focussed on escaping from a lunatic werewolf, he could take it in properly, to try to work out what it was. It was odd, like it was supposed to smell like a forest – that woody, musky scent – but it was too artificial to be believable. At least, it was too artificial to Sherlock's nose.

A human might not notice that, he realised.

A human might wear it as perfume.

A twig snapped behind him, and he whirled around to face the source of the noise.

The first thing he saw was the barrel of a gun, pointing straight at him.

The second thing he saw was the person holding it.

"Mary," he breathed.


	48. Chapter 48

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost forgot to post this one today. I have a major statistics exam tomorrow morning. Wish me luck!
> 
> A million thanks, as always, to Becca (LlamaWithAPen), whose responses to this chapter were well needed. Of all the chapters I've written, this has been the one that I'm most interested in seeing everyone's responses to.

The gun was steady in Mary's hands. Sherlock's gaze flickered between it and the hard expression on her face. This wasn't right. This could not be right, this could not be happening. Sherlock was supposed to meet Moriarty, not –

Was this Moriarty?

Was _she_ Moriarty?

She inadvertently answered his unspoken question seconds later. "Moriarty sends his regards," she said, her voice calm and steady. There was no fear audible in her speech or visible in her face.

Not Moriarty, then. Of course not, that had been a completely illogical deductive leap. Moriarty was a vampire, Sherlock had been certain of it. Mary was not a vampire. Mary had a heartbeat, pumping blood around her veins. She was human.

So then how was she involved in this? Had Moriarty targeted her upon discovering she was getting close to John? Had Moriarty realised that she was in a position where she could hurt them, because they had grown to trust her? Sherlock's gaze flickered to her neck, seeking signs of bite marks that might have suggested she was being dosed with enough venom to make her loyal to him. There was nothing above the collar of her jacket, but that did not rule out the possibility of something lower down.

Mary continued, "He's sorry he couldn't make it."

Was she simply serving as Moriarty's voice? Moriarty had kept himself out of the line of fire for so long; had he chosen Mary as a way to continue to sit above it all? Was he whispering into her ear, telling her what to say? Her ears were covered with a dark beanie; Sherlock could not see if there was an ear piece slotted into one of them.

If she was wearing an earpiece, it was entirely possible that Moriarty was using it to listen not only to what she said, but to what Sherlock said as well.

He reached into his pocket quickly, and he saw her tighten her grip on the gun for a second before she realised that he was reaching for a phone and not for a weapon. He typed out a message as quickly as he could and then turned the screen around so that she could read it.

          Can he hear us?

Her gaze flickered to the screen as she read it, and then she shook her head. "No," she said calmly. "Nor can he see us. It's just us."

Unless, of course, he could see them, and she knew that, and so she was left with no choice but to lie.

Doubt must have crossed Sherlock's face, because Mary reached up and slid the beanie off her head. "No earpieces," she said. "No cameras. And you know as well as I do that there's no one else in this forest. You would be able to smell him, if not hear him. I have no reason to lie to you about this."

Sherlock pocketed his phone again. The gun in Mary's hand remained trained on Sherlock's still heart.

"Mary," he started slowly. "Whatever he's got on you, whatever he's using to threaten you, let me help." He went to take a step closer, but her finger tightened on the trigger, so he stopped before he put his foot down and stood his ground. "I can help you. Whatever he's using to make you do this..."

"Oh, Sherlock," she said, and for a second, something flickered over her face, something almost sad.

No, not sad, Sherlock realised immediately.

She looked disappointed.

Mary continued, "No one is making me do anything."

She might not see it like that, Sherlock thought to himself, if she were being dosed with venom. She might not have been aware that she was being forced to do anything, because she would still have the illusion of free will. Sherlock's gaze flickered to her neck again, but nothing new had been revealed after she had taken her beanie off.

"Then tell me," Sherlock said, keeping his voice soft, gentle. "Why are you working for Moriarty?"

Mary said, "I didn't say that I was working _for_ him."

And it hit Sherlock all at once.

The fact that Mary had started work as a receptionist while John was recovering from an injury. After both Winthers and the hunter from the forest had failed to kill both him and Sherlock.

          The fact that she had immediately taken interest in John – specifically, in John's work with Sherlock.

                    That she was clever, clever enough to solve ciphers at a glance.

                              That within Moriarty's network, there had always been evidence of a sub-organisation of hunters, separate from whoever was  
                              involved in the puzzles that Sherlock had been sent.

                                        That Winthers had been clever enough to outsmart them and get away, but had apparently been foolish enough to still  
                                        give them a name that they   had thought would be a genuine lead.

                                                  That O'Donnell, the gun manufacturer, had a contact that he only referred to in his diary as "M".

                                                            That O'Donnell had meetings with "M", but that Moriarty sat above it all and never got too close.

"The hunters weren't Moriarty's organisation," Sherlock breathed.

"No," Mary said. "He was just a contact."

Sherlock had been so focussed on the big picture, trying to understand the extent of Moriarty's influence and the variety of cases that he was involved in. Now, it felt like his mind was zooming in to a smaller part of the puzzle, to focus on the hunters that had originally captured his attention, long before the name Moriarty had ever reached his ears. Now, it felt like pieces of the puzzle were falling into place, pieces he had not realised were missing because he had been too focussed on the wider image, the general gist and not the specificities.

"You can take the gun out of your trousers," Mary said, interrupting his train of thoughts. Her expression was still cold. "Slowly, if you don't mind."

Sherlock could reach for the gun. His reflexes were faster than a human's. He would be able to fire before she had the chance. The bullets would have been useless against Moriarty, but not against her.

His hand reached behind his back, closed his hand around the gun.

He could turn it on her and shoot before she had a chance to react.

Could he?

Sherlock had killed people. All vampires had, at one point or another. He had hurt people who were far more innocent than her.

And yet, this was different.

He'd never pulled a gun on anyone and fired to kill. He had never killed anyone while his head was clear, while his thoughts were not clouded by bloodlust. He put murderers behind bars. That did not mean he was eager to become one himself.

His gaze flickered between the gun in Mary's hands, and her eyes.

He couldn't kill her. She had information that he needed.

And, hunter or not, she was John's girlfriend.

Sherlock crouched down, and placed the gun on the ground.

"The hunters were a separate organisation," he said slowly as he stood up. The pieces of the puzzle were still coming together in his head, slowly. "Moriarty did not control them. He merely gave you access to resources that you would not have had otherwise."

Mary nodded her head. "He helped with recruitment," she said, "among other things."

"We were right, then, about the bite marks. He is a vampire. You recruit people by drugging them with venom."

"Not always. You'd be surprised how many people come willingly. Others just need a little more persuasion to focus their skill sets on creatures like you."

People couldn't be convinced to kill that easily, Sherlock realised. People who did not have any reason to want to take a life previously would not change their minds so suddenly, not even if they were high on vampire venom frequently enough. Moriarty – and Mary – would have targeted those who did not have a moral compass that kept them from killing, those who had skill sets that made them the right men and women for the job.

"He warned us about you, too," Mary continued. "You caught his attention before you even knew he existed. He's quite a fan of your work."

"He planted the camera in John's flat," Sherlock stated.

"Not him, personally," she said. "One of his other contacts."

"And the puzzles?"

"Were Moriarty," Mary finished. "When he found out that you had heard his name, he couldn't resist getting in touch in one way or another. You thought he was just a member of an organisation of hunters. He had to show you how much bigger his network was."

"Why with puzzles? Why send me to solve cases that he had been involved in?"

Mary's lips pulled up into a ghost of a smile. "It kept you busy," she said. "You'd be surprised how much you missed while you were distracted."

The gun shifted in her grip, and Sherlock's gaze flickered to it automatically, before he looked back at her eyes. He wanted to see a flicker of doubt there, a flicker of uncertainty, but all he was met with was determination.

"So now you're here to kill me," Sherlock said, his mind whirring as he tried to form some sort of plan. There had to be a way for him to escape, or bluff his way out, or _something_. He just had to keep Mary talking for long enough for him to work out what to do. "Your other hunters failed, so you knew you had to do it yourself, and that's why you took the job at John's clinic. So that you could get close to him, and then to me, so you could finish the job."

"That was the plan, yes," Mary said, and Sherlock's mind latched onto the past tense, plans of overpowering her to escape coming to a halt.

"Was," he repeated. "But not anymore." And seconds later, he worked out why. "Because you fell for him."

For a long moment, Mary's expression did not change, and the gun in her hand remained perfectly steady. Then, for a fraction of a second, Sherlock saw her gaze flicker to the ground. "Yes."

Sherlock kept his eyes on the gun, which was still pointed at his chest. Any feelings that Mary had for John might keep her from killing John, but this protection would not necessarily extend to Sherlock. It was not the right time to do anything risky. He waited, and after a moment of silence, Mary spoke again.

"I don't want to kill you," she said. "Either of you."

"That's rather difficult to believe while you have a gun pointed at my chest," Sherlock said. Mary did not lower it.

"You're a vampire," she reminded him. "I'd rather have a weapon on me in case you decide you want to fight."

"What makes you think I'll do that?"

"I am a hunter," she said. "I pose a threat to your kind."

"Technically speaking, so does John."

She hesitated, perhaps considering the probability that a vampire who is content to be friends with a werewolf might still want to kill a hunter, but then she lowered her gun just a little. She did not put it down, nor did she shift it in her grip, so it was still in a position where she could raise it and fire quickly if need be. At this point, Sherlock assumed that it was the best that he could ask for.

"You've seen now what Moriarty is capable of," she said. "You've seen what the hunters are capable of. You've not seen what I am capable of, but I'm sure you can fill in the blanks for yourself. You've gotten closer to Moriarty than anyone before. Now you need to stop."

Sherlock raised his eyebrows. "Is this a threat, Mary? After you said you would do me no harm?"

Mary's expression remained carefully blank. "I said I did not want to kill you. If you leave me no other options, I will." She paused for a moment, letting the determination in her gaze imprint itself firmly in Sherlock's mind, before she continued, "Moriarty's network is vaster and more powerful than you can imagine. One man cannot stand a chance at taking it down, and if Moriarty decides that your meddling is starting to inconvenience him, he will kill you."

"That would be tremendously ambitious of him."

"From what I've heard, your arrogance is precisely what has almost led to your death before. I would not be so certain, if I were you."

Something made a sound nearby, and Mary's gun was immediately raised, pointing at the direction it came from, before she saw a bird land on the branch of a tree nearby. She returned her attention to Sherlock. "You need to stop searching for Moriarty," she continued. "In return, I can keep my hunters out of London. You, John, and Mycroft will be safe."

"How do you know about Mycroft?"

Mary's lips twitched. "Moriarty has his contacts. So, are we in agreement?"

"You're asking me to refrain from investigating the single biggest criminal enterprise I have come across in my life."

"I'm asking you to choose your own safety over a pointless investigation that will ultimately lead nowhere. Moriarty can, and will, remain hidden from you if he wants, and if he wants you dead, he'll organise that too. You, and John. I'm asking you to back off, a lot more nicely than he would."

Sherlock hesitated for a moment, and then asked, "And what of you, then?"

"I'll have left London in the morning," she said. "I've handed in my letter of resignation, and I've left a letter in John's office, giving him an explanation for my sudden departure and thanking him for a wonderful couple of months. I can't stop you from telling him the truth, if you choose, but you know as well as I do that it would hurt him more to know that I've lied to him from the start. I know you care for him, too. We can protect him from that."

"Bit late for that," said a voice from behind Sherlock, behind a nearby tree. Mary raised her gun, Sherlock whirled around, and John stepped out, expression hard.

For the first time, genuine emotion seemed to cross Mary's face. Fear. Shock. Sadness.

"How much did you hear?" she asked quietly.

John came to a stop beside Sherlock. "Enough."

"John," she started, "I'm so-"

"Don't. I don't want to hear it."

In the silence that stretched between them, you could almost hear the tension buzzing in the air. John was the one who broke it. His voice was cold.

"I could kill you."

Sherlock's attention snapped towards him. Mary raised her gun, but now, it trembled just slightly in her hands.

"You were expecting Sherlock," John continued. "So that's got wooden bullets in it. They won't protect you."

Mary hesitated, and then lowered her gun, shifted it to one hand, and raised her hands in surrender.

"There's nothing I can do to stop you," she said quietly. "If you want to kill me, then kill me. But what I felt for you was – is – real, and I think you felt the same."

Sherlock's gaze flickered between Mary's position of surrender, and John's anger, determination. Then, after a moment, John relaxed his shoulders and hung his head, and Mary let out a sigh of relief.

"But you know we can't let you go," John continued after a moment. "You're a murderer. You belong behind bars."

"I know," Mary said quietly. "So I'm sorry."

She raised her gun and fired.

Sherlock let out a cry of pain as he felt it penetrate his chest, and he was falling, falling, falling. He heard John yell his name, and he hit the ground back first, John immediately dropping to his knees beside him.

"Sherlock," he could hear John saying, pushing Sherlock's coat out of the way, hands scrambling at the buttons of his shirt. "Sherlock, stay with me."

The pain radiated through Sherlock's body. For such a small bullet hole, it felt like everything was burning.

He could feel, though. That meant it hadn't hit the heart. Right?

John was talking, saying something - Sherlock's name was the only thing Sherlock could pick out – and then his voice cut off and his expression changed. He looked confused.

The pain was fading, slowly. Sherlock shifted, tilted his head forward to look at his chest.

There was no wound.

His chest was bloody, and he was definitely feeling the effects of the blood loss, but there was no wound.

He sat up slowly, wincing, and then got to his feet. He could move. He could stand. He could walk.

He walked backwards a few steps, swaying a little on his feet, and then he found the bullet, coated in his blood. It was metal, not wood.

"She was bluffing," he said, turning the bullet around in his hand. "She was never going to kill me. Not today."

He looked back over his shoulder. John was sitting on the ground, staring at the blood – Sherlock's blood – on his hands.

Mary was nowhere in sight.


	49. Chapter 49

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million thanks to the best beta ever, Becca (LlamaWithAPen).

John was silent for the entire ride home. He had not spoken a word, not since he had realised that Sherlock was essentially unharmed and did not require urgent medical attention. The wound on Sherlock's chest was completely healed; if it weren't for the blood on his shirt, you would not realise he had been injured at all.

Sherlock's gaze flickered over John, out of the corner of his eye, as the cab took them back to Baker Street. John was sitting up straight, hands clenched into fists and resting on his thighs. His eyes were fixed on the back of the seat in front of him, glaring at it intensely as though the seat itself was solely responsible for all of their problems. His jaw was clenched, and Sherlock could hear his heart rate and his breathing – not elevated, not quite, but sounding as though John was consciously trying to keep them slow and steady. His breathing sounded forced.

When the cab pulled up in front of 221B, John climbed out immediately, leaving Sherlock to pay the driver, which he did (using Mycroft's card) before he headed through the door and up the stairs after John.

John was a man of routine, and he had always had a very strict routine when he came to Baker Street. Whenever he arrived there, almost without fail, he would take a path straight from the door to the kitchen, and he would put the kettle on. However, when Sherlock reached the top of the stairs, he found that John had not moved past the centre of the room. He was just standing there, almost as though he had forgotten what to do, like the events of the past hour had turned his ideas of the world upside down and now the simple act of making tea no longer made any sense.

Maybe Sherlock should offer to make tea himself. John made him mugs of blood from time to time; it was only fair that he did it in return. Plus, in an abstract sort of sense, it was Sherlock's fault that this situation had come to pass. Not only would John not have discovered who Mary was had Sherlock not gone to meet her, but if John had never had any sort of association with Sherlock, Mary never would have targeted him.

Sherlock looked around the room briefly, noting that his laptop was still where he left it, still open. John must have seen the messages on the screen; that must have been how he knew where to find Sherlock. That was Sherlock's fault as well.

Tea. Tea would help. John insisted on the healing properties of tea, so he would feel better after a cup of tea. He just needed a little push getting from now to the point where tea was in his system.

Sherlock got as far as "Should I..." before John exploded.

"What the _Hell_ did you think you were doing?" he exclaimed. He was not quite shouting, but his voice was still loud in contrast to the silence from moments ago, loud enough and startling enough to make Sherlock flinch. He was reminded suddenly of hearing those words once before, in John's voice, the day after he went to see John in Mycroft's basement on the night of the full moon. Same voice, same tone, and yet so much had changed since then.

Now was not the time to consider that, however, as John had turned to face him, and he was fuming, hands clenched into fists by his sides.

"I told you so many times that I wanted to be a part of this investigation, so that I could make sure you didn't go out and get yourself killed. What part of your big head thought it was a good idea to go off on your own at the most dangerous point?"

"You were asleep," Sherlock countered. "You–"

"You didn't think that counted as important enough to wake me up for? Come on, Sherlock, you _knew_ this could have been a trap! The last time you went out to meet a hunter you _literally_ bled out."

"I didn't think I was going to meet a hunter; I thought I was going to meet Moriarty!"

"Oh, yeah, like that's _any_ less dangerous."

Sherlock held his hands up defensive. "John, calm down. You're not angry with me."

John scoffed. "You want to bet?"

"You're angry with Mary, and you're taking it out on me. It's not my fault."

"Yes, it is!" John shouted, raising his voice even more. "For God's sake. I'm angry with her, and I'm angry with you, I'm angry with me for not realising she's been lying to me from the day I met her, and just..." He trailed off, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes and taking a deep, shaky breath.

Sherlock stood in silence, not sure what was expected of him in this situation and wondering if there was anything he should do. He didn't want John to get angry – or, angrier – with him, because the last time that had happened, they ended up brawling on the floor of the sitting room, and Sherlock wasn't sure he had enough blood in his system anymore to survive that.

After a moment, John lifted his head from his hands and met Sherlock's gaze once again. "Why didn't you feed before you left, Sherlock?" he asked, his voice now quieter than it was before, but not quite calm, still with a dangerous undertone.

Sherlock couldn't quite hold John's gaze, so he glanced around, fixating instead on the wall with the map on it (the map that he could now take down, he realised). "You saw the messages on the laptop. You know that Mor- Mary said that she would not be kept waiting." He frowned in thought, trailing off. Was Mary the one who sent those messages, or was it Moriarty? Moriarty had sent the puzzles, and surely it was Moriarty on the phone call. Had he been the one to contact Sherlock to send him to Mary?

It was impossible to tell, and it did not matter now. The case was over. At least, as far as it could be.

John looked sceptical. "You couldn't spare two minutes? You knew you were going into a dangerous situation, you didn't think you might need your strength?"

"It didn't cross my mind. Clearly I'm not hungry enough yet to be too weak to function."

"That's a lie and you know it. You know you're pushing your own body to its limits, rather than feeding when you're supposed to. It's not just today; it's been like this for weeks."

"I'm fine," Sherlock said shortly, moving to walk past John and hoping that breaking the eye contact would finish this conversation.

It did not. Instead, it just stirred up some more of John's anger. He turned so that Sherlock was not out of his line of sight, he raised his voice again. "No, you're not! Do you have some kind of death wish, or something?"

"Of course not."

"Then why are you doing this to yourself? What's this all about?"

"You wouldn't understand," Sherlock said, turning around to face John again.

"Then _explain_ it!" John yelled, and Sherlock snapped back without thinking about it.

"Because it tastes wrong!"

It did not help to calm John's anger, because it wasn't an explanation that made sense. "What the Hell is that supposed to mean?" he said, and Sherlock looked away, hoping that he would drop the conversation.

Unfortunately, John, while not having an IQ as high as Sherlock, was smarter than he looked. He might not have been able to make brilliant deductions about where someone had come from or what secrets they had, but he knew Sherlock, and he knew enough to piece together the information in his head. It took him less than a minute.

"This is because you fed from me, isn't it?" he asked quietly. Sherlock looked at his feet, and then turned around, moving over to his desk and going through his papers. There was nothing more he could gather, the case was over now, but it gave him something to do with his hands, and something to focus his attention on other than John.

"You won't understand, John," he said again, voice softer now. "There's no human, or werewolf, equivalent to blood sharing. I can't explain it to you."

"Try."

Sherlock planted his hands on the desk and hung his head, looking down at the papers. After a moment, he said, "We're not supposed to feed from bags, vampires. We're wired to crave fresh blood. We have... instincts that make us want to either kill, or to take a feeder."

John hesitated for a moment. "So, because you fed from me, you feel some sort of... attachment? Craving?"

Sherlock did not answer. It was not a perfectly accurate explanation, but it was the closest thing he could think of. "I'm fine," he said instead. "I've become accustomed to blood bags before; it'll just take me some time to –"

"Why didn't you just ask me?" John asked, cutting him off, and Sherlock let out a wry laugh.

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Sherlock," John said, and Sherlock reluctantly raised his gaze to John's eyes. When he was looking straight at John, John continued, "You're practically starving yourself. Why didn't you think to ask if I could help?"

Sherlock shook his head quickly, ignoring the way his throat had started to burn, just at the thought of being able to feed from a living body – from _John_ – again. "I'm not going to ask you to become my feeder," he said.

"Good," John replied, walking over and sitting down on the sofa, "because I'm not offering that. I've seen the way you talk about Mycroft's feeder. I'm not interested in being your walking blood bag."

"You wouldn't be," Sherlock said quietly.

John did not comment on that. He shifted on the sofa, and then asked, "Would it make it better or worse if you fed from me again?"

Sherlock shook his head quickly. "I'm not going to ask that of you," he started, but then John all but cut him off.

"That's not what I'm asking," he said. "Don't think about me for a moment here, think about you. I don't know how this all works. You said it yourself; it's not something I can really understand. So you're just going to have to help me out here. Do you need to consistently feed from one or the other, or would you be able to feed from bags if you occasionally fed from me as well?"

Sherlock hesitated for a long moment. His brain could not quite wrap around the fact that this conversation was even happening, and it was even harder to think straight now that his attention had focussed almost entirely on the sound of John's heart, pumping blood around his body. John's heart rate was elevated, but only slightly, and it was still steady. He wasn't afraid. Why wasn't he afraid?

Finally, Sherlock murmured, "I could alternate."

John nodded slowly, and then patted the sofa cushion next to him. When Sherlock hesitated, John jerked his head in the direction. "Sit," he said in a commanding tone, and after a moment Sherlock walked over and sat down beside him. He pressed his back against the arm of the sofa so that there was as much space in between them as possible.

"Werewolf feeders are unheard of, John," Sherlock said after a pause.

"I'm not going to be your feeder," John reminded him.

"Yes, but even offering this at all is unheard of. We can feed from humans because they gain something from the experience, given the way our venom affects their brain chemistry, but you know that my venom could kill you. Without that, you would find it would hurt."

"I'm expecting so," John said, looking far too calm for this conversation. "I've seen your fangs, they're pretty intimidating."

"And you're still offering?"

John leaned back against the sofa. "Remember when you ran some tests on my blood, after I got stabbed? You found I recovered from blood loss quicker."

"That doesn't mean the experience is going to be pleasant for you."

"I never said it was. I'm saying that I can handle it, and I'm saying that you need blood and you're too stubborn to feed from bags. So, I'm agreeing to let you feed from me, occasionally, when _I_ decide to allow you to, if and only if you agree to feed regularly from bags in between. Okay?"

Sherlock stared at John for a long moment. There was no way this conversation was really happening, no way he was hearing it correctly. And yet, John – impossible, possibly insane, brilliant John – was looking at him with a patient expression, without a flicker of fear or doubt on his face.

So, after a long moment, Sherlock nodded his head. "Okay," he said quietly.

"Okay," John said again, and then he shifted, rolling his sleeve up his arm. Sherlock's eyes were immediately drawn to the exposed skin of his wrist.

"Now?" Sherlock said.

John shrugged. "You're starving, you've just been shot, and my girlfriend turned out to be a hunter who wanted both of us dead. Now's as good a time as any."

His voice sounded calm, but Sherlock picked up on the ever so slight change in his heart rate at the mention of Mary. However, he did not comment on it. He was rather distracted by the veins he could see on the inside of John's wrist.

John continued, "Can you control yourself?"

Sherlock bit his own lip, and realised only then that his fangs were extending inside his mouth. "I'm not sure," he confessed.

"Well, I'll yank your hair out if you don't stop quickly enough."

Sherlock's gaze flickered between John's wrist and his eyes. "Are you certain?"

John's voice didn't waver. "Yes," he said. "I trust you."

"Then you're probably an idiot."

John smiled a little, faintly. "No, I don't think so," he said, and he lifted his wrist.

Sherlock hesitated for another moment, placing one hand beneath John's arm to steady it. He sought John's gaze, looking for any evidence of uncertainty, anything to suggest John was not completely okay with this. There was none. John showed no fear, no doubt, nothing to say that he hadn't put all of his trust – perhaps more than was deserved – in Sherlock.

Sherlock bent towards John's wrist, opened his mouth, and bit down.

He heard John wince in pain, felt the muscles in his arm tense before he (presumably consciously) forced himself to relax. It caused his heart rate to speed up, just a little, pumping more blood around his body, blood that was now flowing down Sherlock's throat, filling him with life. It tasted better than he remembered, and he could feel it flowing through his veins, warming his body. It was like that first sip of water when you found yourself parched. He wanted to press closer, to feed more desperately, but he held himself back. He had to stay conscious, not only so he didn't take too much, but also so that he did not accidentally inject John with venom.

He was vaguely aware of John's hand in his hair, like it had been those few months ago. He forced himself to focus on it rather than losing himself in the bloodlust. After a couple of moments, he felt it tighten, as John prepared to pull Sherlock off. It did not end up being necessary. Though it took a considerable amount of willpower not to fight against the hand in his hair, he forced himself to relax, and pull back himself, fangs sliding out of the puncture wounds.

He licked his lips to clean up whatever was left of the blood, and then looked at John. The werewolf was only slightly paler than he had been moments ago, but the expression on his face had not changed. He should look terrified, or at very least shocked. He didn't.

"How are you feeling?" John asked.

"I should be asking you that," Sherlock said. "Are you feeling light-headed?"

John smiled faintly. "Don't worry," he said. "You didn't take that much. I think your self-control is better than you believe."

The hand in Sherlock's hair loosened and began to slide away, and then paused by Sherlock's neck, two fingers pressing against the pulse point. "Huh," John said. "You have a heartbeat."

"Only for a little while, while it pumps your blood around my body," Sherlock said.

Something flickered over John's expression at the mention of _his_ blood, but it was too brief for Sherlock to tell what it meant. "I hadn't even thought about what your heart might actually do, aside from sit there in your chest as a weak point in your body," he commented. "Is it always this slow?"

"For a vampire, this is fast."

John's lips quirked upwards, and he let his hand fall from Sherlock's neck.

"You should probably eat something," Sherlock said after a moment. "That's what you're supposed to do after donating blood, isn't it?"

"I'll make tea," John said, getting to his feet slowly.

"I said eat, not drink."

"Tea with biscuits, then."

Sherlock watched as John moved into the kitchen and put the kettle on the stove, as if nothing had happened. Sherlock knew better than to believe that Mary would have easily left John's mind, knew that he would be trying not to think about it, bottling it up. Maybe focussing on Sherlock, offering his own blood, was all part of John's attempt to distract himself.

Sherlock pressed two fingers to his wrist, feeling the slow pulse, as his heart pumped the fresh blood around his veins – blood that John had offered, given willingly, without gaining anything in return. Humans could get addicted to being fed from, addicted to the high that came with it, but John had no such benefits. He'd not offered this for himself.

"You know," Sherlock said. "You are the most unusual werewolf I've ever met."

John looked over his shoulder, and a ghost of a smile grew over his face. "Yeah," he murmured. "So you've said."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is the last (!!!) and it's also a bit shorter than the rest of them.


	50. Chapter 50

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is it.

When John woke the next day, Sherlock was standing over his bed.

He started suddenly, jerking awake, before his brain recognised the figure and realised that it was not a threat. He rolled over, and pressed his face into the pillow. "For God's sake," he groaned. "Please tell me you've not been taking lessons from _Twilight_."

"Who's Twilight?" Sherlock asked.

"It's a book about..." John started, and then shook his head, rolling over again to face him. "Never mind. Is there a reason you're standing over my bed?" A beat, and then he added, "No, wait, first things first, have you been standing over my bed for long?"

Sherlock shook his head. "Only a minute or two," he said, which made John feel a bit less uncomfortable.

"Well, at least you haven't gotten to the point of watching me sleep," he said. "Don't do that, by the way. Second question, why are you standing over my bed?"

"I came up to make sure you were still alive."

John was not sure what answer he had been expecting, but that was not it. He frowned, shifting and grabbing one of the pillows from under his head. He propped it up against the head of the bed and sat against it, rolling his shoulders. His body still felt sore from the full moon. "Why wouldn't I be alive?"

"You don't usually sleep in this late."

John frowned, and then reached over for his phone on the bedside table, turning on the screen. The clock read 11:53 AM.

"Is it almost noon already?" he mumbled, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes. Being in the army had caused him to become accustomed to early mornings, even when he had nowhere to be that day. Now that he was home, he had started taking more daytime naps, following full moons or occasionally following nights where he was kept up late with investigations, but if he was not kept out of bed the night before, he was usually awake early. He could not remember the last time he had slept in past eight, let alone slept through the entire morning.

There was a mug on the bedside table still half-filled with tea. John could vaguely recall making himself a cup last night and taking it up to his room. He must have been so exhausted that he fell asleep before he had even finished it.

He glanced down at his wrist, gently tracing a finger over the two neat puncture wounds. They scarcely hurt now; he had almost forgotten they were there. It was like he had been injected using two unusually thick needles. There was no trace of blood.

Last night felt like something of a dream, like it had not really happened. A part of him wished that were the case. He wished that last night had been a dream and his (now ex-)girlfriend had not been a hunter who had been interested in John purely because John was a werewolf with a vampire who had somehow, at some point, become his best friend. However, the marks on his wrist told him that all of it had been real. The one normal thing in his life hadn't been all that normal after all, and now he just had to learn to deal with it.

"I got a text from Mycroft this morning," Sherlock said, sitting down on the edge of the bed and bringing John out of his mind. He dragged his gaze away from his wrist to look at Sherlock as he continued, "Everyone we know to be a part of the organisation – that is, the hunters, not Moriarty's network more generally – who were in London purchased either plane or train tickets this morning. They're all gone."

"And Mary?" John prompted, trying and failing to sound nonchalant.

Sherlock did not meet his eyes. "We're not sure," he confessed after a pause. "I asked Mycroft to trace her, but there's been no sign of her since last night. Her flat has been emptied entirely. The only evidence she existed at all is the note she said she left in your office."

John slumped back against the pillows. Despite everything, a part of him was disappointed that he might never see her again. Another part of him was relieved. "So that's it, then. It's over."

Sherlock smiled wryly. "I don't think it's ever truly over. We only scratched the surface of Moriarty's network. We might not be able to seek it out now ourselves, but I don't doubt that we'll see it again. A consulting detective and a consulting criminal; I'd be surprised if our paths never crossed again."

John found himself hoping they wouldn't, though he did not say this aloud.

Silence fell between them for a moment, though it wasn't tense or awkward. Sherlock's gaze had taken to wandering around the room again, the expression on his face thoughtful. Perhaps he was still thinking about the case. John wondered if it annoyed Sherlock, that he had not really been able to solve it.

John brushed his fingertips over his wrist again, and considered getting up and dressing, making the most of the small amount of the day that he had left, before Sherlock spoke again.

"I've been thinking..."

"Really? You, thinking? Whatever was that like?"

Sherlock glared, and continued, "Even though we're no longer investigating this organisation, I'd like you to continue your work with me. Having your medical expertise, among other things, could prove very useful in future investigations."

John nodded his head, not needing long to consider the offer. He had gone with Sherlock on a handful of non-organisation-related cases during their investigation, and it had been an interesting experience. It made him feel useful again, too, like he felt when he was in the army. As a general practitioner at a surgery, he could only help a little, but as a detective, or at least a partner of a detective, with knowledge in areas that Sherlock did not possess, he could do so much more. "As long as you're not planning on telling me to quit my day job to help you, y-"

Then he was cut off by Sherlock continuing, "And I think you should move in with me."

John blinked. "What?"

"It's practical," Sherlock said quickly. "It would be inefficient if I were to need to call on you for investigations while you were staying at a separate address, not to mention we'd save on cab fares to and from the Yard if we did not have to make two stops. That, and if you're to..." he hesitated, somewhat awkwardly, and continued, "monitor my feeding habits, so to speak, it would be vastly preferable if you were here. Besides, I'm sure Mrs Hudson will be pleased to have someone eating her groceries."

John thought about the miserable little bedsit that he had been living at since he had returned to London. He thought about the camera in his kitchen, and his difficulties falling asleep at night ever since they'd found it. He thought about how often he had found himself looking online for other available places, but always finding that they were out of his price range, his army pension coupled with the small amount that he earnt working part-time at the surgery putting a huge limitation on his options.

He thought about how much more comfortable he had always felt, coming back to Baker Street rather than going to his own place, and he thought about the past few weeks, living there. He thought about Mrs Hudson, as well as Sherlock. He thought about how easy it had been to settle into a routine living at Baker Street, not to mention how much better he had slept, knowing there was someone else to keep watch over the flat.

"So, if you'd like to," Sherlock finished, almost nervously. "I'd like you to move in with me."

John waited for Sherlock to meet his eyes, and then smiled. "Yeah," he said. "I think I will."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're done.
> 
> This fic has been the longest that I've written - longer, even, than my own fiction works - and it's been an absolutely wild ride. This has been the outcome of almost two years of work, of using opportunities when I didn't have to study to write, or writing frantically on a morning before I had to catch a bus. When I started this mid-2014, I did not expect this to be the end result.
> 
> The original plan for this fic was going to only have about twenty chapters. In my planning phase, I jotted down all the major plot points, and figured I'd work around them. Originally, there was no organisation, and there was no Moriarty, and no Mary. In the original plan, the climax was their first encounter with that hunter, and then it was going to conclude much in the same way that the current story has concluded, albeit with much less time to properly develop their relationship. The addition of the organisation came as a result of a comment I received on the hunter chapter - a comment that said they were wondering whether or not the hunter worked alone. My mind saw this and ran away with it, and this was the end result. So, to the person who inspired that idea, thank you.
> 
> I owe a lot of thanks to a lot of you. Firstly, to Becca (LlamaWithAPen), who I've been thanking every chapter since she started helping me with this fic, and who I still cannot thank enough. If it weren't for her, this fic would have many more typos in it, and probably would not make nearly as much sense. I also have her to thank for being my moral support and helping me make sure that every chapter I posted wasn't terrible.
> 
> And secondly, and equally as importantly, I owe a million thanks to everyone who has followed this story, and especially to those who have commented. Your comments and reviews have helped motivate me to keep writing and updating as regularly as I could manage, as well as inspiring me with regards to some of the points in this fic (as I've already mentioned). Never underestimate the power your comments have. Anyone who writes on this site will agree with me when I say they mean the world.
> 
> And so this is the end. However, if you've liked my writing style, then I'll let you know that I'm already working on another fic: this one, a series of one-shots, alternate universes and alternate ways that John and Sherlock could have met. I'm accepting prompts for this fic already, so if you have any ideas, feel free to shoot me a message, and if you've enjoyed An Unusual Association, then please keep an eye out for my next one.
> 
> And now, my friends, I bid you farewell, with another huge thank you to every single one of you who has followed this story for so long. Thank you for everything, and goodbye for now.


End file.
